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Copyright, 1896, 

By D. APPLETON AND COMPANY. 



TO OUR FRIEND 


JULIA 


MAECH HARES. 


CHAPTER L 

Oif the morning of his thirtieth birthday, 
Mr. David Mosscrop lounged against the low 
stone parapet of Westminster Bridge, and sur¬ 
veyed at length the unflagging procession of 
his fellow-creatures plodding past him north¬ 
ward into the polite half of London town. 

He had come upon the bridge in a melan¬ 
choly frame of mind, and had paused first of 
all gloomily to look down at the water. His 
thoughts were a burden to him, and his head 
ached viciously. This was no new experience 
of a morning, worse luck; he had grown ac¬ 
customed to these evil opening hours of de¬ 
pression and nausea. The fact that it was his 
birthday, however, gave uncomfortable point 

to his reflections. He had actually crossed 
1 



2 


March Hares, 


the threshold of the thirties, and he came into 
the presence of this new lustrum worse than 
empty-handed. He had done none of the 
great things which his youth had promised. 
He had not even found his way into helpful 
and cleanly company. The memory of the 
people with whom he spent his time nowadays 
—in particular, the recollection of the wastrels 
and fools with whom he had started out yes¬ 
terday to celebrate the eve of his anniversary 
—made him sick. He stared down at the 
slowly-moving flood, and asked himself angrily 
why a man of thirty who had learned nothing 
worth learning, achieved nothing worth the 
doing; who didn’t even know enough to keep 
sober over-night, should not be thrown like 
garbage into the river. v 

The impulse to jump over the parapet 
hung somewhere very close to the grasp of his 
consciousness. His mind almost touched it as 
his eyes dwelt upon the broad, opaque mass of 
shifting drab waters. He said to himself that 
he had never before been so near the possibility 
of deliberate suicide as he was at this moment. 



Ma/pch Ha/res. 


3 


He did not allow the notion to take any more 
definite shape, but mused for a while upon the 
fact of its lying there, vaguely formless at the 
back of his brain, ready to leap into being at 
his will. Of course, he would not give the 
word: it was merely interesting to think that 
he was in the same street, so to speak, with 
the spirit of self-murder. 

After a little, the effect of this steadily 
drifting body of water seemed to soothe his 
vision. He grew less conscious of mental dis¬ 
turbance and physical disgust alike. Then he 
stood up, yawned, and glanced at the big 
clock-tower, where the laggard hands still clung 
to the unreasonable neighbourhood of seven 
o’clock. For some reason, he felt much better. 
The sensati^ was very welcome. He drew a 
long breath of satisfaction, and, leaning with 
his back to the stonework, fell to watching 
the people go past. By a sudden revulsion of 
mood, he discovered all at once that the excess 
of the night was now offering him compensa¬ 
tions. His brain was extremely clear, and, 
now that the lees of drink were gone, served 



4 


March Hares. 


him with an eager and almost fluttering acute¬ 
ness which it was pleasant to follow. 

He noted with minute attention the vary¬ 
ing types of workmen, shopgirls, clerks, and 
salesmen as they trooped by in the throng, 
and found himself devoting to each some ap¬ 
propriate mental comment, some wondering 
guess into their history, or some flash of specu¬ 
lation as to their future. The instantaneous 
play of his fancy among these flitting items 
brought great diversion. He rollicked in it— 
picking out as they trudged along side by side 
the book-keeper who was probably short in 
his accounts, the waiter who had been backing 
the wrong horses, the barmaid with the 
seraph’s face who at luncheon time would be 
listening unmoved to conversation from City 
men flt to revolt a dock labourer. It was in¬ 
deed as good as a play, this marvellous aggre¬ 
gation of human dramatic possibilities surging 
tirelessly before him. He wondered that he 
had never thought of seeing it before. 

From amusing details his mind lifted itself 
to larger conceptions. He thought of the 



Ma/rch Ha/res. 


5 


mystery of London’s vast economy; of all its 
millions playing dumbly, uninstructedly, al¬ 
most like automata, their appointed parts in 
the strange machinery by which so many 
droves of butchers’ cattle, so many thousands 
of tons of food and trucks of clothing and 
coals and oil were brought in daily, and Baby¬ 
lon’s produce was sent out again in balancing 
repayment. The miracle of these giant scales 
being always kept even, of London’s ever- 
craving belly and the country’s never-failing 
response, loomed upon his imagination. Then, 
stifling another yawn, it occurred to him that 
a brain capable of such flights deserved a bet¬ 
ter fate than to be banged out by a dirty tide 
against some slime-stained wharf-pile down 
the river. Yes, and it merited a nobler lot in 
life, too, than that of being nightly drenched 
with poisonous drink. Decidedly he would 
forswear sack, and live cleanly. 

The hour struck in the clock-tower. The 
boom of the great bell swelled hopefully upon 
his hearing. The chime of the preceding 
quarter had saddened him, because he heard 



6 


March Ha/res, 


in it the knell of thirty wasted years. The 
louder resonance now bore a different mean¬ 
ing. A birthday exposed a new leaf as well as 
turned down an old one. The twenties were 
behind him, and undoubtedly they were not 
nice. Very well; he turned his back upon 
them. The thirties were all before him ; and, 
as Big Ben thundered forth its deep-voiced 
clamour, he straightened himself, and turned 
to look them confidently in the face. 

His eyes fell upon the figure of a young 
woman, advancing in a little eddy of isolation 
from the throng, a dozen feet away. Even on 
the instant he was conscious of a feeling that 
his gaze had not distinguished her from the 
others by mere chance; it was, indeed, as if 
there were no others. In the concentrated 
scrutiny which he found himself bending 
upon her, there was a sense of compulsion. 
His perceptions raced to meet and envelop 
her. 

She was almost tall, and in carriage made 
the most of her inches. She had much yellow 
hair of a noticeable sort, pale flaxen in bulk 



March Hanres, 


7 


but picked with lemon in its lights, about her 
brows. He thought that it was dyed, and in 
the same breath knew better. He mastered 
the effect of her fine face—with its regular 
contour, its self-conscious eyes, its dainty rose- 
leaf of a chin thrust reliantly forth above a 
broad, white throat—all in some unnamed frac¬ 
tion of a second. 

The impression of her filled every corner 
of his mind. He tried to think about who 
and what she was, and only built up scaffold¬ 
ings of conjecture to knock them down again. 
She was a girl who tried on mantles and 
frocks in some big Regent Street place: no, 
the lack of dignity in such an avocation would 
be impossible to one who carried her chin so 
high. A woman journalist? Ho, she was too 
pretty for that. What was she—type-writer, 
restaurant-waitress, saleswoman? Ho, these 
all wore black, with white collar and wrist¬ 
bands ; and her apparel was of an almost fiar- 
ing order. Her large-sleeved bodice of flow¬ 
ered blue silk, snug to the belted waist, sug¬ 
gested Henley rather than the high road out 



8 


Ma/rcTi Hares, 


of squalid Lambeth. Her straw sailor-hat, 
jauntily borne on the primrose fluff and coils 
of hair, belonged, too, not a mile lower on the 
river than Teddington. She should by rights 
have a racquet in her hand, and be moving 
along over the close-shaved lawn of Eane- 
lagh’s park, on a hazy, languid summer after¬ 
noon. What on earth was she doing on West¬ 
minster Bridge, at this ridiculous hour, in this 
dismal company ? 

Then speculation died abruptly. She was 
close to him now, and he i^ocognize(Lher. She 
was a young woman whoni he had ^een in the 
British Museum reading-room a score of times. 
Her face was entirely familiar to him. Only 
the other day he had got down for her, from 
the county-histories shelves, two ponderous 
volumes which she had seemed unable to man¬ 
age by herself. She had thanked him with a 
glance and a pleasant nod. He seemed to re¬ 
call in that glance a tacit admission that they 
were old acquaintances by sight. He looked 
her square in the eye, meanwhile, the inner 
muscles of his face preparing and holding in 



Ma/rch Ha/res, 


9 


readiness a smile in case she gave a sign of re¬ 
membering him. 

For a moment it appeared that she was 
passing without recognition. He had the 
presence of mind to feel that this was a gross 
and inexcusable mischance. His feet instinc¬ 
tively poised themselves to follow her, as if it 
were for this, and this only, that they had tar¬ 
ried so long on the bridge. 

Before he could take a step, however, she 
had halted,.and, in a wavering fashion, moved 
sidelong out of the main current of pedestrian- 
ism. She stood irresolutely by the parapet for 
a few seconds, with a pretence of being inter¬ 
ested in the view of the river and the prim 
stretch of Parliamentary architecture on its 
right bank. Then, with a little shrug of de¬ 
cision, she turned to him. 

“ It is a fine morning,” she said. 

He had stepped to her side, and he bent 
upon her now the smile which had so nearly 
gone a-begging. “ I was afraid you hadn’t 
noticed me—and I had quite resolved to go 
after you.” 



10 


March Ha/res. 


She flashed inquiry into his face, then let 
her glance wander vaguely off again. “ Oh, I 
saw you well enough,” she confessed, with a 
curious intermingling of hesitation and bold¬ 
ness ; “ but at flrst I wasn’t going to pretend 
I did. In fact, I don’t in the least know why 
I did stop. Or, rather, I do know, but you 
don’t, and you never will. That is to say, I 
shan’t tell you! ” 

“ Oh, but I do know,” he answered genial¬ 
ly. “ How should you imagine me so deficient 
in discernment? Only—only, I think I won’t 
tell either.” 

She looked at him again with a kind of 
startled intentness, and parted her lips as if to 
speak. He fancied that he caught in this gaze 
the suggestion of a painful and humbled diffi¬ 
dence. But then she tossed her head with a 
saucy air and smiled archly. “What a tre¬ 
mendous secret we shall carry to our graves! ” 
she laughed. “ Tell me, do you sleep on the 
bridge ? One hears such remarkable stories, 
you know, about the readers at the Museum.” 

He regarded her with pleasure beaming in 



March Hares, 


11 


his eyes. “ No, I go entirely without sleep,” 
he replied, with gravity, “ and walk about the 
streets turning a single idea for ever in my 
mind; and every morning at daybreak—oh, 
this has gone on for years now—I come here 
to watch for the beautiful girl with the yellow 
hair who some time is to come up to me and 
remark, ‘It is a fine morning.’ A fortune¬ 
teller told me, ever so long ago, that this was 
what I must,do, and I’ve never had a moment’s 
rest since.” 

“ You must be very tired,” she commented, 
“ and a good deal mixed in your mind, too, 
especially since yellow hair has come so much 
into fashion. And did the fortune-teller men¬ 
tion what was to happen after the—the beau¬ 
tiful lady had really appeared ? ” 

“ Ah, that is another of my secrets! ” he 
cried, delightedly. 

They had begun to stroll together toward 
the clock-tower. The throng bustling heed¬ 
lessly past with hurried steps gave them an 
added sense of detachment and companion¬ 
ship. They kept close together by the para- 
2 



12 


March Hares, 


pet, their shoulders touching now and again. 
When they reached the end of the bridge, and 
paused to look again upon the river prospect, 
their manner had taken on the ease of people 
who have known each other for a long time. 

The tide was running out now with an 
exaggerated show of perturbed activity. The 
girl bent over, and stared at the hurrying 
current, sweeping along in swirling eddies 
under the arch, and sucking at the brown- 
grey masonry of the embankment wall as it 
passed. Her silence in this posture stretched 
out over minutes, and he respected it. 

At last she had looked her fill and turned, 
and they resumed their walk. “ I could never 
understand drowning,” she remarked, musing¬ 
ly ; “ it doesn’t appeal to me at all, somehow. 
They talk about its being pleasant after the 
first minute or so, but I don’t believe it. 
Do you?” 

“ There might possibly be some point about 
it—if one could choose the fiuid,” he replied, 
achieving fiippancy with an effort. “ Like the 
Duke of Clarence, for example.” 



March Hares, 


13 


“ How do you mean ? The papers all said 
it was influenza. Oh, I see—you mean the 
Shakespeare one.” Her good faith was un¬ 
doubted. “But no, we were speaking of 
drowning—of suicide.” 

“ No, we weren’t,” he said, soberly. The 
memory of his own mood a brief half-hour 
ago stirred uneasily within him. “ And we’re 
not going to, either. What the mischief have 
you—young and healthy and happy and pretty 
as a peach—to do with any such things ? ” 

“ In fact,” she went on thoughtfully, as if 
he had not spoken, “ all kinds of death seem 
an outrage to me. They make me angry. It 
is too stupid to have to die. What right have 
other people to say to me, ‘Now you must 
die ’ ? I was born to live just as much as they 
were, and I have every whit as much right on 
the earth as they have. And I have a right 
to what I need to keep me alive, too. That 
must he so, according to common-sense! ” 
Mosscrop had listened to this declaration 
of principles but indifferently. A sense of 
drowsiness had stolen over him, and, yielding 



14 


Ma/rch Ha/res, 


to it for the moment, he had hung his head, 
with an aimless regard upon the pavement. 
All at once he caught sight of something that 
roused him. His companion’s little boot, dis¬ 
closed in movement beneath her skirt, was 
broken at the side, and almost soleless. He 
lagged behind for a step or two, and made 
sure of what he saw. The girl in the silken 
blouse was shod like a beggar. 

“ Which way are you going ? ” he asked, 
with a pretence of suddenly remembering 
something. He had halted, and they stood at 
the corner, looking up Whitehall. He smoth¬ 
ered a yawn with a little explanatory laugh. 
“ I made rather a night of it—it’s my birth¬ 
day to-day—and I’m half asleep. I hadn’t 
noticed where we’d walked to. I hope I 
haven’t taken you out of your way.” 

The girl hesitated, looked up the broad, 
stately street, and bit her lip in strenuous 
thought of some sort. 

“ Good morning, then ! ” she blurted out, 
confusedly, and turned to move away. 

The impulse to be quit of her had been 



March Hares. 


15 


very sharply defined in his mind, and had dic¬ 
tated not only his words, but his awkward, 
half-shamefaced, half-familiar, manner in sug¬ 
gesting a parting. Now it vanished again with 
miraculous swiftness. 

“ No, no! You mustn’t go off like that! ” 
he urged, and sprang forward to her side. “ I 
only asked you which was your way.” 

She was blinking her eyes in a struggle to 
regain facial composure. He could see that 
she had been on the point of tears, and the 
sight moved him to recklessness. It was not 
surprising to hear her confess: “ Me ? I have 
no way.” 

He took charge of her with a fine paternal 
tone. “ Oh yes, you have ! Your way is my 
way. You are going with me. It’s my hirth- 
day, you know, and you have come to help me 
celebrate it. What do you say to beginning 
with a special breakfast?—or perhaps you’ve 
spoiled your appetite already. But you can 
pretend to eat a little.” 

The girl laughed aloud, with pathetic irony 
at some conceit which curled her lip in scorn- 



16 


March Ha/res, 


ful amusement. Words rose to her tongue, 
but she forbore to utter them, and stared up 
the street. 

“ You’ll come along, won’t you ? ” He had 
held up his hand, and a four-wheeler, with a 
driver and horse of advanced years and deject¬ 
ed aspect, was crawling diagonally across the 
roadway toward them. 

She took courage to look him frankly in 
the face. “ I shall be very much obliged to 
you, indeed,” she said, keeping her voice up 
till the avowal should be finished. “ I’ve had 
no breakfast.” 

The ancient cab, with a prodigious rattling 
of framework and windows for its snail’s prog¬ 
ress, bore them along past Trafalgar Square, 
and westward through narrow streets, already 
teeming with a busy, foreign-looking life, till 
it halted before a restaurant in one of the 
broader thoroughfares of Soho. 

When they had alighted, and the sad old 
driver, pocketing his shilling in scowling 
silence, had started off, a thought occurred to 
Mosscrop. 



March Hares. 


17 


“ I tell you what we’ll do,” he broke forth. 
“We’ll decree that it’s your birthday, too, so 
that we can celebrate them together. That 
will be much more fun. And before we go 
into breakfast, I must get you a little present 
of some sort, just to mark the occasion. Come, 
you haven’t anything to say about it at all. 
It’s my affair, entirely.” 

He led the way along past several shops, 
and halted in front of a narrow window in 
which a small collection of women’s boots was 
displayed. A man in shirt-sleeves and apron 
had just taken down the shutter, and stood 
now in the doorway, regarding them with a 
mercantile yet kindly smile. 

“It is the best Parisian of make,” the 
shoeman affirmed, to help forward Mosscrop’s 
decision. 

“ You can see how different they are from 
ordinary English things,” said David, argu¬ 
mentatively. “The leather is like a glove, 
and the workmanship—observe that! I don’t 
believe any lady could have a more unique 
present than a pair of real French boots.” 



18 


March Hares. 


The girl had come up, and stood close be¬ 
side him, almost nestling against his shoulder. 
He saw in the glass the dim reflection of her 
pleased face, and moved toward the door as if 
it were all settled. Then, as he stepped on 
the threshold, she called to him. 

“No—please!” she urged. “I think we 
won’t, if you don’t mind.” 

“ Of course we will! ” he insisted, turning 
in the doorway. “Why on earth shouldn’t 
we? It’s your birthday, you know. Come, 
child, you mustn’t he obstinate; you must be 
nice, and do what you’re told.” 

As she still hung back, shaking her head, 
he went out to her. “What’s the matter? 
You liked the idea well enough a minute ago. 
I saw you smiling in the window there. Come! 
don’t let a mere trifle like this spoil the be¬ 
ginning of our great joint-birthday. It’s too 
bad of you 1 Won’t you really have the boots 
—from me ? ” 

“ Well,” she made answer, falteringly, “ it’s 
very kind—but if I do, I’d rather you didn’t 
come into the shop—that is, that you went out 



March Ha/res, 


19 


while I was trying them on—because—well, it 
is my birthday, you know, and I must have 
my own way—a little. You will stop outside, 
won’t you ? ” 

This struck him as perhaps an excess of 
maidenly reserve. He smiled impatiently. 
“ By all means, if it is your whim. But—but 
I’m bound to say—I suppose different people 
draw the line at different places, but feet always 
seemed to me to be relatively blameless things, 
as things go. Still, of course, if it’s your 
idea.” 

“No, if you take it that way,” she said, 
“we’ll go and get our breakfast, and say 
no more about it.” She found the for¬ 
titude to turn away from the window as she 
spoke. 

“ If I take it that way! ” The perverse¬ 
ness of this trivial tangle annoyed him. “ Why, 
I consented to stop outside, didn’t I ? What 
more is demanded ? Do you want me to pass 
a vote of confidence, or shall I whistle during 
the performance, so that you may know I am 
cheerful, or what? Suppose I told you that I 



20 


March Hares, 


had been a salesmari in a boot-shop myself, 
and had measured literally thousands of pretty 
little feet—would that reassure you ? I might 
come in, then, mightn’t I ? ” 

“ No—you never were that —you are a gen¬ 
tleman.” She stole a perplexed glance up at 
him, and sighed. “ I should dearly love the 
boots—but you won’t understand. I don’t 
know how to make you.” Looking into his 
face, and catching there a reflection of her 
own dubiety, she burst suddenly into laughter. 
“ You are a gentleman, but you are a goose, 
too. My stockings are too mournful a patch- 
work of holes and darning to invite inspection 
—if you will have it.” 

“ Poor child! ” He breathed relief, as if a 
profoundly menacing misunderstanding had 
been cleared up. “ Here, take this and run 
across to that fat Jewess in the doorway there. 
She will fit you out.” 

Presently she returned, with beaming eyes, 
and an air of shyness linked with compla¬ 
cent self-approbation which he found de¬ 
lightful. 



March Ha/res, 


21 


“ Oh, I should simply insist on your com¬ 
ing in nowy"* she cried gaily, at the door of the 
boot-shop, in answer to his mock look of def¬ 
erential inquiry. 



CHAPTEE II. 

“There surely was never such another 
breakfast in the world! ” 

She spoke with frank sincerity. Upon 
afterthought she added : “ I don’t believe any 
woman could order a meal like that. You 
men always know so much about eating.” 

Mosscrop leant back in his chair, crossed 
his knees, and took a cigar from his pocket. 
His mind ran in pleasurable retrospect over 
the dishes—a fragrant omelette with mush¬ 
rooms, a sole Marguerite^ a delicate little steak 
that had been steeped in oil over night, a 
pulpy Italian cheese which he never got else¬ 
where than here. The tall-shouldered, urn¬ 
shaped green bottle on the table still held a 
little Capri, and he poured it into her glass. 

“ Yes,” he assented, “ I find myself paying 
22 


Ma/rch Ha/res, 


23 


more attention to food as I get older. It is 
the badge of advancing years. It is a good 
little restaurant, isn’t it ? I come here a great 
deal.” 

“ And that is how you are able to order 
such wonderful breakfasts for hungry young 
ladies. It comes of practice. Do they all en¬ 
joy it as much as I have ? ” 

“ You mustn’t ask things like that,” he re¬ 
monstrated, smilingly, as he lit a match. “ I 
hope you don’t mind?—thanks.” He re¬ 
garded her contemplatively through the dis¬ 
solving haze of the first mouthful of smoke. 
They had the small upstairs dining-room to 
themselves, and she, from her seat by the win¬ 
dow, let her glances wander from him to the 
street below, and back again, with a charming, 
child-like effect of being delighted with every¬ 
thing. The sight of her opposite him stirred 
' new emotions in his being. He imported a 
gentle gravity into his smile, and dropped the 
jesting tone from his voice. “Ho—we must 
play that I have never breakfasted with any¬ 
body before—like this—either here or any- 



24 


Ma/rch Hares. 


where else. Let us both start fresh on our 
birthday. We wipe everything off the slate, 
and make a clean beginning. First of all, you 
haven’t told me your name.” 

“ My name is Vestalia Peaussier.” 

“ Then you are not English ? I could have 
sworn you were the most typically English girl 
I’d ever laid eyes on.” 

“ My father was a French gentleman—an 
officer, and a man of position. He died— 
killed in a duel—when I was very young. I do 
not remember him at all. My mother brought 
me away from France at once. She was dread¬ 
fully crushed, poor lady. She was the daugh¬ 
ter of a very old Scottish house—it had been 
a runaway love match—and her people, my 
grandparents-” 

“ What part of Scotland ? What was 
their name ? I am a Scot myself, you 
know.” 

Vestalia paused briefly, and sipped at her 
wine. “ I was going to say—my grandparents 
behaved so unfeelingly to my mother that she 
never permitted herself to mention their name. 



March Hares, 


25 


I do not know it myself. I gathered as a child 
from poor mother’s words that they were ex¬ 
tremely wealthy and proud, and had a title in 
the family. It is not probable that I shall ever 
learn more. I should not wish to, either, for 
it was their hard cruelty which broke my 
mother’s heart. She died two years ago. 
Poor unhappy lady ! ” 

Mosscrop nodded sympathetically. “And 
were you left without anything ? ” 

“ My mother’s private fortune had been 
diminished to almost nothing by bad invest¬ 
ments and the treachery of others before her 
death. I had no one to advise me—I was all 
alone—and the lawyers and others probably 
robbed me cruelly. Only a few of her old 
family jewels were left to me—and one by one 
I had to part with these. Some of them, I 
daresay, were of great antiquity and priceless 
value, if I had only known, but I was forced 
to sell them for a song. There were wonder¬ 
ful signet-rings among them, all with the 
crest of the family—I suppose it must have 
been her family~and at first I thought of 



26 


Ma/rch Ha/res, 


using it to trace them—but then my girlish 
pride-” 

“What was the crest?” asked David. 
“ Perhaps it wouldn’t be too late, now.” 

Again Vestalia hesitated. Then she shook 
her head. “No; dear mamma’s wishes are 
sacred to me. I do not wish to learn what 
she thought it best to keep from me.” 

“Well—and when the jewels were all 
sold?” 

“ Long before that I had begun to work 
for my living. I write a good hand naturally. 
I got employment as a copyist, but that did 
not last very long. I was ambitious, and I 
thought I might work my way into literature. 
But it is a very disheartening career, you 
know.” 

Mosscrop had lifted his brows in some 
surprise. He nodded again, with a cursory 
“Ay!” 

“ The editors were not at all kind to me,” 
she went on. “I toiled like a slave, but I 
hardly ever got anything accepted, and then 
you had to wait months for your pay, and 



March Hares, 


27 


perhaps not get it at all. I should have 
starved long ago, if I hadn’t met an American 
woman at the Museum who was over here get¬ 
ting up pedigrees. Oh, not for herself. She 
made a regular business of it. Kich Ameri¬ 
cans paid her to hunt up their English an¬ 
cestors, in genealogies and old records, and on 
tombstones and so on. I was her assistant for 
nearly a year, and things went fairly well with 
me. But three months ago she was taken ill 
and had to go home, and there I was stranded 
again. I tried to go on with some of the jobs 
she left unfinished, hut the people had gone 
away, or hadn’t confidence in so young a per¬ 
son, and well—that’s all. My landlady turned 
me out at six o’clock this morning, and she 
has seized the few poor things I had left—and 
here I am.” 

The young man lifted his glass, and 
clinked it against hers. “ I am very glad that 
you are here,” he said; and they smiled wist¬ 
fully into each other’s eyes as they finished the 
Capri. 

“ It is a heavenly little break in the clouds, 
3 



28 


March Hares, 


anyway,” she went on, dreamily. “It isn’t 
like real life at all: it is the way things hap¬ 
pen in fairy stories.” 

“ Quite so. Why shouldn’t we have a fairy 
story all by ourselves ? It is every whit as easy 
as the stupid, humdrum other thing, and a 
million times nicer. Oh, I’m on the side of 
the fairies, myself.” 

She looked out, in an absent fashion, at 
the windows across the way. The light be¬ 
gan to fade from her countenance, and the 
troubled lines returned. “Every day for a 
fortnight I have been answering advertise¬ 
ments,” she went on, pensively; “ some by let¬ 
ter, some in person. There were secretaries’ 
places, but you had to know shorthand, and 
the typewriter, and all that. Then somehow 
all the vacancies for shop-women got filled 
before I applied, or else people with experi¬ 
ence in the business were preferred to me. I 
even went in for the ‘lady-help’ thing—a 
kind of domestic servant, you know, only you 
get less pay and don’t wear a cap—but nobody 
would have me. My hair was too good and 




Ma/rch Hares, 


29 


my boots were too bad. The lady of the 
house just stared at these two things, every 
place I applied at, and said she was afraid I 
wouldn’t answer.” 

The picture she drew was painful to Moss- 
crop, and he made an effort to lighten it with 
levity. “ I confess I didn’t think very highly 
of your boots, myself,” he said, cheerily, “ but 
I admire your hair immensely.” 

“ Oh, but you are a man ! ” 

He chuckled amiably at the implication of 
her retort, and she laughed a little, too, in a 
reluctant way. “ It occurs to me,” he ven¬ 
tured, pausing over his words, “that men 
seem to have played no part whatever in the 
story of your life.” 

“ No, absolutely none,” she answered, with 
prompt decision. “ I have never before been 
beholden to a man for so much as a biscuit or 
a shoe-button. I don’t know that you will be¬ 
lieve me when I tell you, but I’ve never even 
been alone in a room with a man before in my 
life.” 

“ Of course, I believe what you say. It is 



30 


March Hares, 


remarkably interesting,though. Come! First 
impressions are the very salt of life. I should 
dearly like to know what you think of 
the novel experience, as far as you’ve 
gone.” 

She seemed to take him seriously. Plac¬ 
ing her elbows on the table, and poising her 
chin between thumbs and forefingers, she be¬ 
stowed a frank scrutiny upon his face, as in¬ 
tent and dispassionate as the gaze which a 
professor of palmistry fastens upon the lines 
of the client’s hand. 

“First of all,” she said, deliberately, “I 
am not so afraid of you as I was.” 

“ Delightful! ” he cried. “ Then I did in¬ 
spire terror at the outset. It has been the 
dream of my life to do that—if only just once. 
I feared I should never succeed. My dear 
lady, you have rescued me from my own con¬ 
tempt. My career is not a blank failure after 
all. We must have coffee and a liqueur after 
that!” 

He pressed the bell at his side. She frowned 
a little at his merry exuberance. 



March Hares, 


31 


“ I am not joking,” she complained. “ You 
asked me to say just what I felt.” 

He nodded his contrition as the waiter left 
the room. 

“ Yes, do,” he urged. “ I will keep as still 
as a mouse.” 

“ I am not as afraid of you as I was,” she 
repeated, dogmatically. “ But I think, even if 
I knew you ever so well, I should always be 
just the least weeny bit afraid. I can see that 
you are very kind—my Heavens! nobody else 
has ever been a hundredth part as kind to me 
as you are—but all the same—yes, there is a 
hut^ if I can explain it to you—I get a feeling 
that you are being kind because it affords you 
yourself pleasure, rather than because it helps 
me. Ho—that is not quite what I mean either. 
It seems to me that a man will be much kinder 
than any woman knows how to be, so long as 
he feels that way; but when he doesn’t feel 
that way any more—well, then he’ll chuck 
the whole thing, and never give it another 
thought.” 

“ That is very intelligent,” said Mosscrop. 





32 


Ma/rch Ha/res, 


He had the appearance of turning it over in 
his mind, and liking it the more upon con¬ 
sideration. “ Yes, that is soundly reasoned. 
I can well believe your mother was a Scots 
lass.” 

Vestalia flushed, no doubt with pride. 

“Well, then, hear me out,” she said, with 
a pleasant little assumption of newly-gained 
authority. “ Now, I’ve hardly known a man 
to speak to—that is, a gentleman, as a friend, 
you know—if I’m justifled in calling you so 
on such short acquaintance—or no, I mustn’t 
say that, must I? We are friends—but it’s a 
new experience, quite, to me. As you say, I 
have my flrst impression of what it is like to 
have a man for a friend.” 

The waiter, pushing the door open with 
his foot, brought in a tray with white cups 
and silver pots, and wee tinted glasses, and a 
tall, shapeless bottle encased in a basket-work 
covering of straw. 

“I ordered maraschino,” remarked Moss- 
crop, as the man poured the coflee. “ If you 
prefer any other, why, of course-” 




Ma/rch Hares. 


33 


“ Oh no; whatever you say is good, I take 
with my eyes shut.” 

She sipped at the little glass he had filled 
for her, and then, with a movement of lips 
and tongue, mused upon the unaccustomed 
taste. An alert glance shot at him from her 
eyes. 

“ I hope-” she began to say, and stopped 

short. 

“ You hope what?” 

“ No; I won’t say what I was going to. It 
would have been a very ungrateful speech. 
Only, you must bear in mind that I hard¬ 
ly know one wine from another, and I am 
leaving myself absolutely in your hands. You 
will see to it, won’t you, that—that I don’t 
drink more than I ought.” 

Mosscrop waved his hand in smiling re¬ 
assurance. 

“ But now for that famous first impression 
of yours.” 

She narrowed her eyelids to look at him, 
and he found her glance invested with some¬ 
thing like tenderness of expression. Her head 



34 


March Hares* 


was tilted a bit to one side, so that the light 
from the window fell full upon the face. It 
was a more beautiful face than he had thought, 
with exquisitely faint and shell-like gradations 
of colour upon the temples and below the ears, 
where the strange but lovely primrose hair be¬ 
gan. A soft rose-tint had come into her 
cheeks, which had seemed pallid an hour be¬ 
fore. The whole countenance was rounded 
and mellowed and beautified in his eyes, as he 
answered her lingering, approving gaze. 

“ My impression ? ” she spoke slowly, and 
with none of the assurance which had marked 
her earlier deliverance. “Well, you know, I 
don’t feel as if I knew men any more than I 
did before. I only know one man—a very, 
very little. I don’t believe that other men are 
at all like him, or else we should hear about it. 
The world would be full of it. No one would 
talk of anything else. But the man I do know 
—that is, a little—^well, I’d rather know him 
than all the women that ever were born, even 
if I had to be afraid of him all the while into 
the bargain.” 



March Ha/res, 


35 


Mosscrop laughed. 

“We did well to label it in advance as a 
first impression. It is the judgment of a babe 
just opening its eyes. My dear child, I’m 
afraid this isn’t your birthday, after all. 
You’re clearly not a year old yet.” 

“You always joke, but I’m in sober ear¬ 
nest.” She indeed spoke almost solemnly^ and 
with an impressive fervour in her voice. 
“ You do impress me just like that. I wish 
you’d believe that I’m saying exactly what I 
feel. Mind, I expressly said, I don’t suppose 
for a minute that other men are like you.” 

“ No, you’re right there,” he broke in. 

Her manner, even more than the speech, 
affected him curiously. He drained his 
liqueur at a gulp, stared out of the window, 
fidgetted on his chair, finally rose to his 
feet. 

“ You’re right there! ” he reiterated, biting 
his cigar and thrusting his hands deep in his 
pockets. She would have risen also,, but he 
signed to her to sit still. “ Other men are not 
like me, and they can thank God that they’re 



36 


March Hares, 


not. They know enough to keep sober; I 
don’t. They are of some intelligent use in 
the world; I’m not. They lead cleanly and 
decent lives, they control themselves, they 
make names for themselves, they do things 
which are of some benefit at least to somebody. 
Ah-h! You hit the nail on the head. They 
are different from me! ” 

She gazed up at him, dumb with sheer 
surprise. He took a few aimless steps up and 
down, halted to scowl out of the window at 
the signs opposite, and then flung himself 
into the chair again. Sprawling his elbows 
on the table, he bent forward and fastened 
upon her a look of such startled intensity that 
she trembled under it and drew back. 

“Why, do you know, yofr foolish little 
girl,” he began, in a ho§,rse, declamatory 
voice, “ that a few minutes^efore you came 
along, there on the bridge, I was going to 
throw myself into the river, because I wasn’t 
fit to live. Do you realize that I had sat in 
judgment upon myself, and condemned myself 
to death—death, mind you!—because I was 



March Ha/res, 


37 


an utterly hopeless creature, a waste product, 
a drunkard, a sterile fool and loafer, a veri¬ 
table human swine ? That is the truth! Do 
you know where I spent last night—where I 
woke up, sick with disgust for myself, this 
morning? No, you don’t; and there’s no need 
that I should tell you.” 

“ I don’t care ! ” The girl’s lips propelled 
the words forth with extraordinary swiftness, 
but the eyes with which she regarded her com¬ 
panion, and the rest of her face, grown pale 
once more, remained unmoved. 

“No, you don’t care!” lie groaned out a 
long sigh, and went on with waning vigour. 
“ But I care! It is something to me that 
I am what I am; that I have wasted 
my life, thatjfl have done nothing, and 
worse than nothing, with my chances, that 
I-” 

“You misunderstand me,” Yestalia inter¬ 
posed, with a perturbed simulation of calm. 
“ What I meant was that whatever happened 
last—that is, at any time before this morning 
—makes no difference whatever in my—my 




38 


March Hares, 


liking for you.” Her eyes brightened at the 
thought of something. “ It was you yourself 
who said we would wipe the slate clean, and 
begin all over again quite fresh. Don’t you 
remember? And we were to have our own 
fairy story, all to ourselves. You do remem¬ 
ber, don’t you ? ” 

He still breathed heavily, but the gloom 
upon his face began to abate as he looked at 
her. He moved one of his hands forward on 
the table to the neighbourhood of hers, and 
stroked the cloth gently as if it were her hand 
he touched. A weary smile, born in his eyes, 
strengthened and spread to soften his whole 
countenance. 

“ Yes, I remember everything,” he mused, 
with a kind of forlorn gladness in his tone. It 
seemed an invitation to silence, and they sat 
without words for a little. 

With a constrained air of having con¬ 
vinced herself by argument that it was the 
right thing to do, Vestalia all at once lifted 
her hand, and laid it lightly on his. He 
fancied that it trembled a little. His own 




March Hares, 


39 


certainly shook, though he pressed it firmly 
upon the table. 

“Now the bad spirits have all gone,” he 
said; “ it is fairyland again.” 

“ Ah, we must keep it so,” she answered, 
and pressed his hand softly before she with¬ 
drew her own. The black mood had fied 
from him as swiftly as it came. Vestalia’s 
eyes beamed at the sight of his restored good- 
humour with himself, and she nodded gay ap¬ 
probation. 

“I fancy we’ve about exhausted the de¬ 
lights of this place,” he remarked, after a 
brief silence filled for both of them with a 
pleasantly sufficient sense of friendship at 
its ease. “I’ll pay the bill, and we’ll tod¬ 
dle.” 

She glanced about her. “I shall always 
remember this dear little stufiy old room. I 
almost hate to leave it at all. I want to fix in 
my mind just how it looks.” 

“ Oh, we’ll come often again,” he re¬ 
marked, lightly. Then it occurred to him 
that this assurance contained perhaps an ele- 



40 


March Hares, 


ment of rashness. “Have you got anything 
special to do to-day?” he asked, with awk¬ 
ward abruptness. 

The question puzzled and troubled her. 
“ I was going to celebrate my birthday,” she 
murmured, with a wistful, flickering smile 
ready to fade into depression. 

“ Of course you are; that’s all settled,” he 
responded, making up by the heartiness of his 
tone for the forgetful stupidity of his query. 
“ What I meant was—what were you thinking 
of doing before—before you knew you had a 
birthday on hand ? ” 

Vestalia examined the bottom of her coffee- 
cup, and poked at it with the spoon. “ Me ? 
Oh, I had several things to do,” she made re¬ 
ply, hesitatingly. “ I had to And something 
to eat, and contrive how to earn some money, 
and hunt up a new lodging, and see how I was 
going to feed myself to-morrow, and—and 
other small matters of that sort.” 

His comment was prefaced with a kind, 
sad little laugh. 

“ You must go to the old place, and get 



Ma/rch Hares, 


41 


your things,” he said. “How much do you 
owe?” 

“ I’d rather not go back at all.” She ven¬ 
tured to look up at him now. “ I don’t want 
ever to lay eyes on that old hag again.” 

“ But your things. If I sent a commis¬ 
sionaire, would she give them up?—on pay¬ 
ment of the bill, of course.” 

“ They’re not worth a bus-fare—they’re 
really not. You see,” she went on with her 
reluctant confidences, “ I had to pawn every¬ 
thing. These clothes I have on are every rag 
I have left.” 

Mosscrop, regarding her with a sympa¬ 
thetic gaze, recalled very clearly the gown she 
used to wear at the Museum. It was a queer 
colour—a sort of rusty greenish-blue ; it was 
of common stuff, and made without a waist, 
in some outlandish Grosvenor Gallery fashion 
novel to his eye. The practical side of him 
stumbled at this memory. “ But if you had 
to pawn things,” he said, “I should have 
thought these silks you have on would have 
gone first. That frock you used to wear at 



42 


March Hares, 


the Museum, for instance—you could only 
have raised a few pence on that—whereas 
these things—I’m afraid, my young friend, 
that you haven’t a good business head.” 

“ Oh, better than you think,” she retorted, 
with downcast eyes. Her further words cost 
her a visible effort. “ I thought it all out, and 
I saw that my only chance was to hang on to 
these clothes. If people didn’t happen to look 
at my boots, I was all right. Men don’t notice 
such things much—you yourself didn’t at 
first. And my skirt would hide them, more 
or less.” 

He looked at her averted face, slowly as¬ 
similating the meaning of what she said. 
Then he hastily turned his chair sidewise, 
rang the bell for the waiter, lit a fresh cigar, 
and blew out the match with a sigh which 
deepened into an audible groan. 

“ What else could I do ? ” she faltered, 
with a fiushing cheek, and a tear-dimmed 
stare out of the window. “ Nothing but throw 
myself into the river. And that I worCt do. 
They have no right to insist upon my doing 




Ma/rch Hares, 


43 


that. If I was old and horrid, it wouldn’t 
matter so much. But I’m young, and I want 
to live. That’s all I ask—just the chance to 
live. And that I won’t let them rob me of, if 
I can help it.” 

The waiter, counting out the change, em¬ 
braced the couple in a series of calm, side¬ 
long glances. He expressed polite thanks for 
the shilling pushed aside toward him, and 
closed the door behind him when he left 
the room with an emphasized firmness of 
touch. 

Mosscrop rose. “Come, child,” he said, 
briskly. “Cheer up! Look up at me—let’s 
see a smile on your face. A little brighter, 
please—that’s more like it. How we have 
wiped the slate clean! We begin absolutely 
fresh. Dry your eyes, and we’ll make a start. 
We’ve got those celebrated birthdays of ours 
to look after—and it’s high time we set 
about it.” 

She stood up, and smilingly obeyed him 
by dabbing the napkin against her nose and 

brows. She moved across to the mirror above 
4 



44 


March Hares, 


the mantel, and smiled again at what she saw. 
Then she looked down at her boots, and her 
face took on a radiance, which it kept, as she 
descended close behind him the narrow stair¬ 
way. 



CHAPTER HI. 


Theke was a bar at the front of the res¬ 
taurant—a cheerful, domestic bar of the Ital¬ 
ian sort, with a bright-eyed, smiling, middle- 
aged woman in charge. She knew Mosscrop, 
and flashed a kindly glance of southern com¬ 
radeship at him as he came forward, and 
stopped and drew his cheque-book from his 
pocket. There were also two girls in the bar, 
and they knew him too, and grinned gently at 
his salute. Vestalia watched them narrowly, 
and fancied that one of them also winked. 

“ I had to stop and get some more money,” 
he explained, when they were in the street to¬ 
gether. “There isn’t another place in these 
parts where they would change a cheque.” 

“ I noticed that they seemed to know you,” 
she replied, with reserve. 

45 


46 


Ma/rch Ha/res. 


“ Dear people that they are ! ” he cried. 
“ The sight of them in the morning is always 
delightful to me. Did you observe it—the 
extraordinary cheerfulness of them all ? You 
saw how the girls chaffed the ice-man, and 
how the fellow who brought in the soda-water 
cases had his joke with the waiters, and how 
madame clucked and chuckled like a good 
hen, as if they were all her brood, and every¬ 
body seemed to like everybody else ? ” 

“I didn’t get the notion that they were 
very keen about we,” remarked Vestalia. “ As 
a matter of sober fact, they scowled.” 

“ Nonsense I Of course they were defer¬ 
ential to you—you represented a sort of digni¬ 
fied unaccustomedness to them, and they 
were afraid to beam at you. But bless you, 
they’re as simple and as sweet-hearted as chil¬ 
dren. They laugh and smile at people just 
out of pure native amiability. The place is as 
good as a tonic to me of a morning when I am 
feeling blue and out of sorts.” 

“ But you are not this morning,” she re¬ 
minded him. 



March Hares, 


47 


For answer he drew her hand through his 
arm. They^ fell into step, and moved along at 
a sauntering gait on their way toward Oxford 
Street. 

It was mid-August, and there had been a 
shower overnight. The pavement still showed 
damp in its crevices, and the air was clear and 
fresh. A pale hazy sunshine began to mark 
out shadows in the narrow thoroughfares. 
By-and-by it would be hot and malodorous 
here, but just now the sense of summer’s 
charm found them out even in Soho. 

She had asked him about himself. The 
question had risen naturally enough to her 
lips, and she had propelled it without diffi¬ 
dence. But when the words actually sounded 
in her own ears, they frightened her. The 
inquiry seemed all at once personal to the 
point of rudeness. The possibility of his re¬ 
senting her curiosity rose in her mind, and on 
the instant flared upward into painful cer¬ 
tainty. 

“ Oh, forgive me; I had no business to ask 
you! ” she hurriedly added. 



48 


March Ha/res, 


He laughed, and patted her arm. “ Why 
on earth shouldn’t you ? ” 

“ I spoke without thinking,” she faltered. 
“ I suppose—that is, it occurs to me—perhaps 
gentlemen don’t like to be questioned—what 
I mean is, you didn’t answer, and I was 
afraid-” 

“ Afraid nothing! ” he reassured her. 
“You mustn’t dream of being stand-offish 
with me. I shall get vexed with you if 
you do. My dear little lady, there isn’t any¬ 
thing in the world that you’re not as free as 
air to say to me, or ask me. I only hesitated 
because”—he began, smiling in a rueful, 
whimsical way down at her—“because it’s 
too complicated and sinister a recital to rush 
lightly into. My name is David Mosscrop, 
and I am an habitual criminal by profession. 
That will do to start with.” 

Vestalia looked earnestly into his face for 
some sign that he was jesting. It was a 
clean-shaven face, cast by nature in a mould 
of gravity. The eyes had seemed a pleasant 
grey to her first cursory examination; but 



Ma/rch Hares, 


49 


now, on closer scrutiny, there might be a 
hardness as of steel in their colour. The lips 
and chin, too, had a sharpness of line that 
could mean unamiable things. And yet, how 
could she credit his words ? It was true, she 
recalled, that by all accounts many superior 
gamblers, burglars, and other evil characters 
were in private life most kindly persons—of 
notoriously generous impulses. Pictures of 
the outlaws of romance, from Eobin Hood to 
Dick Ryder, crowded upon her mental vision. 
The countenance into which she tremulously 
stared might have belonged to any of them—a 
little blurred by the effects of recent drink, a 
trifle stained in its lower parts by the need of 
a razor, yet adventurous, subtle, courageous; 
above all, commanding. Her heart fluttered 
at the thought of her own temerity in leaning 
on his arm, and she shot a swift glance for¬ 
ward toward the big thoroughfare they were 
nearing, where there would be crowds of 
people to see her. Then she tightened her 
hold, and said to herself that she didn’t mind 
a bit. 



50 


March Hares, 


“ You said I might ask anything I liked,” 
she found herself saying. “ What is your 
special line of crime ? ” 

“Well, specifically, I don’t know just how 
they would define me. I am not quite a con¬ 
fidence-man, because nobody ever reposes an 
atom of confidence in me. Mine is a peculiar 
sort of case. I cannot be said to deceive any 
one by my game, and yet, undoubtedly, I 
come under the general head of impostors. I 
make my living by obtaining money under 
false pretences.” 

The girl was frankly mystified. This 
sounded so poor and mean that her instincts 
fluttered back to the original notion that he 
was joking. Sure enough, she could see the 
laughter latent in his eyes, now that she 
looked again. 

“ You’re just fooling! ” she protested, and 
tugged admonishingly upon his arm. “Tell 
me what it is you do, quick !” 

“ How do you know I do anything ? ” he 
demanded. He hugged her arm against his 
side, to show what great fun it all was. 



Ma/rch Hares. 


51 


“Why shouldn’t I be a gentleman at large? 
There are such things, you know.” 

She shook her head. “ Gentlemen at large 
don’t read hard at the Museum in August. I 
never understood they were much given to 
reading at any time of year, for that matter. 
No, I know you do something. You are in a 
profession; I can see that. You are not a 
doctor; you are too polite and kind-mannered 
for that. I thought at first that you were a 
journalist, but they don’t have cheque-books. 
Oh, tell me, please I ” 

He laughed gaily. “ Ten thousand guesses 
and you’d never hit it. My dear lady, I pro¬ 
fess Culdees.” 

Vestalia pondered the information with 
gravity for a little, stealing sidelong glances 
to learn if this was more of his fun. “ You 
can see how ignorant I am,” she remarked at 
last. “ You will recognise presently that you 
are wasting your time with me. What are 
Culdees? Or is it a thing? I assure you I 
haven’t the remotest notion.” 

“ It is a secret,” he assured her, in tones 



54 


March Hares. 


much very genuine liking and friendship by 
those to whom they are good enough to give 
their company,” Mosscrop finished the sen¬ 
tence for her. He smiled to himself as he 
pressed her arm still more closely. The girl 
was not accustomed to drink, and the Capri 
and maraschino had gone to her tongue. He 
was pleasantly conscious of their influences 
himself, and upon second thought he liked his 
companion all the more for the innocent fear¬ 
lessness with which she had followed his ex¬ 
ample. The charm of the whole experience 
strengthened its hold upon him. He looked 
down with tenderness upon her. “ Yes, very 
genuine friendship—and gratitude,” he reiter¬ 
ated, with ardour in his low voice. 

She did not conceal the enjoyment she had 
in both look and tone. “ The idea of real 
companionship is so precious in my eyes,” she 
murmured—“a true communion of minds. 
There is nothing else in life worth living for. 
Do you think there can be any real friendship 
without genuine intellectual respect ? ” 

“ Oh, I wouldn’t lay too much stress on 



March Hares, 


55 


that myself,” he answered, lightly. “I find 
that the fellows I really like the most—the 
men that I take the most solid comfort in 
putting in time with—are tremendous duffers 
from any intellectual point of view, but of 
course”—he found himself hastily adding— 
“that is among men. I have never known 
anything at all about women friends—that is, 
of what one may honestly call friends. But I 
am learning fast. I have reached the point of 
forming an ideal: she must be tall, with her 
hat just brushing above my collar. She must 
have the most wonderful pale yellow hair in 
the world, and the prettiest face, and new 
French boots—and ” 

“You don’t care in the least what kind 
of a mind she has,” put in Vestalia, dole¬ 
fully. 

“ Ah, you didn’t let me finish. She will 
have a spirit brave and yet tender, a mind 
broad and capable yet without arrogance, a 
temperament attuning itself to each passing 
mood, sunny, shadowed, merry, pensive, ad¬ 
venturous, timid—all as full of sweet little 



56 


March Hares, 


turns and twists and unexpected ttiings in 
general as an April day. I don’t ; want her 
learned: I should hate her to be' lo^cal. I 
like her just as she is: I wouldn’t; have her 
changed for the world.” .. ' 

In details the definition perhayis'left some¬ 
thing to be desired. But its form of presen¬ 
tation brought a flush of , satisfaction to Ves- 
talia’s cheek. She nestled closer still against 
his shoulder for a dozen paces or so, and when 
she drew away then, let him feel that it was 
because they were at Oxford Street, and for 
no other reason. 

“ Oh, the beautiful day! ” was all she said. 

They turned to the right, and sauntered 
aimlessly along down ttiQ broad pavement, 
pausing now and agaih to glance over some 
tradesman’s display, then drifting onward 
again, close together. Before a bookseller’s 
window at a corner they made a more consid¬ 
erable halt. Mosscrop scanned the rows of 
titles minutely, talking as he did so. Thus 
between comments on the volumes they looked 
at, and idle remarks on subjects which these 



March Hares. 


57 


suggested, she picked up this further account 
of her new friend’s affairs. 

“ I told you I was a Scotchman,” he said. 
“ I was the son of a factor, a sort of steward 
over a biggish estate, and I never did any¬ 
thing but go to school from the earliest 
moment I can remember. It is as if I was 
born in a class-room, and cradled on a black¬ 
board. It is a terrible land for that; tuition 
broods over it like a pestilence. Their idea is 
to make of each child’s brain a sort of intel¬ 
lectual haggis; the more different kinds of 
stuff there are in it, the greater the fame of 
the teacher and the pride of the parents. I 
shudder now when I think how much I knew 
at the age of twelve. As for my eighteenth 
year, when I took the Strathbogie exhibition, 
Confucius, John Knox, and Lord Bacon rolled 
in one would have been frightened of me. 
My information was appalling. My mother 
died from sheer excess of astonishment at hav¬ 
ing given birth to such a prodigy. My father 
took to drink. The magnificence of my at¬ 
tainments not only threw him off his balance 



58 


Ma/rch Ha/res, 


—it debauched the entire district. It is the 
law of history, you know, that communi¬ 
ties and nations progress to a certain point, 
achieve some crowning deed in a golden age 
of splendid productiveness, and then wither 
and go off to seed. Well, my parish, having 
produced me, reached its climax. Industry 
flagged, enterprise died down; the very land 
ceased to grow as much corn to the acre as 
formerly. The people could do nothing but 
congregate at the taverns and discuss with 
bated breath my meteoric progress across the 
academic heavens. Oh, I was a most remark¬ 
able young man! 

“It happened that there was also a re¬ 
markable old man in my neighbourhood. He 
came from nobody in particular, and went 
away young. People had long since forgotten 
that there had been such a lad, when one day 
he returned to us, well along in years, and in¬ 
famously rich. I don’t mean that he had come 
wrongfully by his money. God knows how 
he got it; the story ran that it had something 
to do with smoked fish. Whatever its source, 



March Hares, 


59 


his wealth was wanton, preposterous, criminal 
in its dimensions. He had no kith or kin 
remaining to him. Of course we knew he 
would build and endow an educational estab¬ 
lishment. All rich old Scotchmen do that, as 
an ordinary matter. They have reared for us 
such myriads of brand-new colleges and semi¬ 
naries on every hillside that I marvel even the 
rabbits and pheasants can escape learning to 
spell. There are logarithms in the very at¬ 
mosphere. 

“ But this old man was not to be put off 
with a mere academy. He piled up a verita¬ 
ble castle of instruction, a first-class fortress 
of learning. And he had an idea of some¬ 
thing which should be unique among all the 
schools of the world. It was all his own idea. 
Even in Scotland it had not occurred to any¬ 
one else. You must know that in early Scotch 
ecclesiastical history, say from the eighth to 
the twelfth centuries, there are occasional 
mentions of some bounders called Culdees, 
who seem to have run a little sacerdotal show 

of their own, something between hermits and 
6 



58 


Ma/rch Hcures, 


—it debauched the entire district. It is the 
law of history, you know, that communi¬ 
ties and nations progress to a certain point, 
achieve some crowning deed in a golden age 
of splendid productiveness, and then wither 
and go off to seed. Well, my parish, having 
produced me, reached its climax. Industry 
flagged, enterprise died down; the very land 
ceased to grow as much corn to the acre as 
formerly. The people could do nothing but 
congregate at the taverns and discuss with 
bated breath my meteoric progress across the 
academic heavens. Oh, I was a most remark¬ 
able young man! 

“It happened that there was also a re¬ 
markable old man in my neighbourhood. He 
came from nobody in particular, and went 
away young. People had long since forgotten 
that there had been such a lad, when one day 
he returned to us, well along in years, and in¬ 
famously rich. I don’t mean that he had come 
wrongfully by his money. God knows how 
he got it; the story ran that it had something 
to do with smoked flsh. Whatever its source, 



March Hares, 


59 


his wealth was wanton, preposterous, criminal 
in its dimensions. He had no kith or kin 
remaining to him. Of course we knew he 
would build and endow an educational estab¬ 
lishment. All rich old Scotchmen do that, as 
an ordinary matter. They have reared for us 
such myriads of brand-new colleges and semi¬ 
naries on every hillside that I marvel even the 
rabbits and pheasants can escape learning to 
spell. There are logarithms in the very at¬ 
mosphere. 

“ But this old man was not to be put off 
with a mere academy. He piled up a verita¬ 
ble castle of instruction, a first-class fortress 
of learning. And he had an idea of some¬ 
thing which should be unique among all the 
schools of the world. It was all his own idea. 
Even in Scotland it had not occurred to any¬ 
one else. You must know that in early Scotch 
ecclesiastical history, say from the eighth to 
the twelfth centuries, there are occasional 
mentions of some bounders called Ouldees, 
who seem to have run a little sacerdotal show 

of their own, something between hermits and 
6 



60 


March Hares. 


canons-regular — it is absolutely impossible 
now to make out just what they were. But 
this extraordinary old man was quite clear in 
his mind about them. He had reasoned it all 
out for himself. He said that ‘ Culdees ’ was, 
of course, a mere popular corruption of ‘ Chal¬ 
dees.’ He loved to argue this with all comers, 
and he did so,—my word for it, he did ! How 
nobody in Scotland ever agrees with any view 
or opinion advanced by any other person, but 
the art of disagreeing has been reduced, by 
ages of use, to a delicately-modulated system. 
Everybody disputed his ridiculous notion of 
the ‘ Chaldees ’—they would have fought it 
just as stoutly if it had been a wise one—but 
he was a very rich man, and he had benevo¬ 
lent intentions toward the district, and so they 
‘roared him gently as any sucking dove.’ 
They couldn’t admit his contention, oh no, 
but they let him feel that they were thinking 
about it, that it had made an impression on 
their minds, that in due time they might see 
it differently. 

“ The upshot was that the old fool estab- 



Ma/rch Hares, 


61 


lished a Culdee Chair in the faculty of his 
new college, and made it worth more money 
than any other professorship of the lot. The 
celebrity of my performances at school was 
fresh then, and reached his ears. He gave 
the billet to me, and confirmed it to me in 
his will when he died, a year later—and that 
is all.” 

“ And you actually only work three weeks 
a year ? And get paid a whole year’s salary 
for that ? ” 

Vestalia regarded him with astonishment, 
as she put the question. 

They had strolled meanwhile down the 
great thoroughfare, crossed it, and passed into 
a narrower lateral by-way. 

“ It is hardly even three full weeks’ work,” 
he replied. “ There is nothing to do in the 
way of fresh discovery. Eeeves and Skene 
and other fellows have gleaned the last spear 
of straw in the stubble. I do go through the 
form of getting up some lectures each Au¬ 
tumn, but it is really such dreadful humbug 
that I’m ashamed to look the students in the 



62 


March Hares, 


face, let alone my fellow-professors. Fortu¬ 
nately, most of the latter are clergymen, and 
that makes it a little easier. They know that 
they are as big frauds as I am, in their own 
line of goods, and so we say nothing about it.” 

“ What struck me,” she began, hesitatingly, 
“ you spoke rather—what I mean is, you don’t 
appear to be very grateful to the old gentle¬ 
man who arranged all this for you—and to me 
it seems the most wonderful thing I ever heard 
of. I should thank his memory on my bended 
knees every day of my life if I were the Pro¬ 
fessor of Culdees. I couldn’t find it in my 
heart to poke fun at him; I should think 
of him and revere him as my benefactor, 
always ! ” 

“ Hm—m ! ” said Mosscrop. “ I’m not sure 
I don’t wish he’d never been born, or had 
choked on a bone of one of his own damned 
Finnan baddies, before ever he came back 
tons!” 

The ring in his voice, like a surly rattling 
of chains, brought back to her vividly the 
scene of his despondency at the restaurant. 




March Ha/res, 


63 


She made haste to lay her hand upon his 
arm. 

“ Oh, do you see where we are ? ” she cried, 
vivaciously, snatching at the chance of di¬ 
version. 

Sure enough, a section of the Museum’s 
stately front lay before them, filling to top¬ 
heaviness the perspective of the small street. 
They had wandered instinctively toward this 
pre-natal rendezvous of their friendship. 
Their eyes softened now as they looked at the 
grey, pillared block of masonry stretching 
across the end of their by-way. 

“ It draws us like a magnet,” said Moss- 
crop. “ Come, what do you say ? Shall we 
go in for an hour, and wander about as if we 
were nice rural people come up to London to 
see the sights? I should like to myself.” 

“ The dear old place! ” sighed Yestalia, 
with mellow tones. 



CHAPTEE IV. 

It was a long hour that the Museum 
claimed from them. 

“ This is what always attracts me most of 
all,” said Mosscrop upon entering. He turned 
to the left, and led the way into the little gal¬ 
lery of the Eoman portrait-busts. “ Very often 
I never go any farther than this. The mod¬ 
ernness of these fellows is a perpetual marvel 
to me. It is as if we met them every day. 
Look at Caracalla and Septimius Severus; 
they are exactly like Irish members. And see 
Pertinax, here; I know at least ten old farmers 
about Elgin who might be his own brothers. 
Observe this man Hadrian. He is the abso¬ 
lute image of Francis the First. You know 
the portraits of him at Hampton Court—what ? 
never been there ? Ah, that’s a place we will 

64 


Ma/rch Hares, 


65 


go to together. There is one picture of Francis 
there—he is very drunk, apparently, and has 
got hold of the hand of the Duchess of Some- 
thing-or-other, and she is in her cups, too, and 
the inane, leering, almost simian happiness of 
the two—oh, it is worth a long journey just to 
see that one picture.” 

“It doesn’t sound very inviting,” com¬ 
mented Vestalia. “ Tipsy women are repul¬ 
sive, whether they are duchesses or not.” 

Mosscrop chuckled. “ Oh, but you must 
make allowances for the period. It was the 
Kenaissance, the joyful, exuberant, devil-may- 
care Eenaissance. If once you catch the 
inner spirit of it, you will feel that it was the 
most glorious of periods. And Francis the 
First was the living, breathing type of it. 
There was a man for you! He celebrated Ms 
birthday all the year round. And in this 
particular instance, why, I daresay it was 
the Duchess’s birthday too. I should have 
thought you would take a more lenient view 
of such a pleasing double anniversary.” 

Vestalia looked doubtfully at him. “ I 



66 


March Hares, 


hope you don’t mean that I am in my cups, as 
you call it,” she said. 

He laughed her suspicion down. “Ho, I 
won’t let you hint at such an absurd thing. 
My dear friend, I must cultivate your sense of 
humour. The roots exist, but the growth is 
choked by the weeds of Lambeth—or was it 
Kennington ? We must have them up.” 

“ But I don’t know when you are joking,” 
she protested. “ Besides, I always understood 
that the Scotch were not a joking people.” 

“ Ah, you confuse two things. It is said of 
us, with some justice, that we are slow to com¬ 
prehend the jokes of others. But of the mak¬ 
ing of jokes by ourselves there is no end. 
And—ah, here is Hero. I love Hero ! ” 

“ Is that a joke, too ? ” 

“ Ah, no,” he answered, more seriously. 
“ It is in my nature to love all the people 
whom history has picked out to condemn. If 
you knew the sort of creatures who wrote the 
histories—the old chronicles and records and 
so on—you would understand my point of 
view. They were full of all meannesses and 



March Hares, 


67 


narrow bigotries; they calumniated everybody 
they couldn’t blackmail. Take the case of 
Eichard Ljonheart and his brother John, in 
your own English history. The former was 
a ferocious and turbulent blackguard, who 
neglected all his duties of kingship without 
shame, plundered his own subjects by torture 
and rapine, and was altogether a curse to his 
own people and everybody else. The mere 
trick of his having a taste for songs and music 
saved him. He buttered up the bards, and 
they fastened him in history as a hero. It is 
precisely the same thing that is done now by 
politicians who take pains to make friends 
with the newspapers. On the other hand, 
John was a model monarch, diligent, hard¬ 
working, extraordinarily attentive to his duties, 
travelling for ever up and down the country 
to hold courts of justice, and right the wrongs 
poor people suffered at the hands of the 
barons and the abbots and other powerful 
ruffians. It is plain enough that the poor 
people loved him ; after all these centuries his 
name continues to be the most popular baptis- 



68 


March Hares. 


mal name among them. But the bards and 
monkish chroniclers were in the pay of the 
barons and abbots, and they paint John for us 
as the most evil scoundrel in English history. 
That’s the way it has always been done. I 
should like to have Nero’s side of his story. 
I know he must have been a splendid fel¬ 
low, to have got the historians so violently 
against him. I shouldn’t be surprised if he 
was really almost as fine as Kichard the 
Third.” 

“How amusing!” said Vestalia at this 
point, and Mosscrop was swift to take the hint. 
They moved on through the Greek rooms, 
where the girl had more of a chance. She 
had known a few of the students who are ac¬ 
customed on giving days to offer up sacrifices 
of time and crayons and good white paper in 
front of the more fashionable statues, and this 
had provided her with what, seemed to her 
companion an exhaustive familiarity with 
Hellenic art. This advantage followed and 
remained with her amid the sombre and lofty 
fragments of the Mausoleum, and shone about 



March Hares, 


69 


her when they confronted the frieze of the 
Parthenon. 

“ It is not my subject,” he remarked, de¬ 
lightedly. “ This is a Hermes, you say, and 
that a Winged Goddess of Victory. Ah, and 
this is a Kiver God. I don’t think I’ve ever 
been here before. Tt is charming—to come 
with you. We supplement each other. Sure 
enough, I ought to have foreseen that you 
would know about Greek art. It is just the 
field that would attract a beautiful young 
woman. It fits you—it belongs to you.” 

“ Now—now! ” she admonished him, hold¬ 
ing up a finger in playful protest. 

“ Oh,” he urged, “ if I’m not to say that 
you are beautiful, we might as well not have 
any birthday at all. That is its most elemen¬ 
tary fact—lying at the very foundation of every¬ 
thing. To ignore it would be like trying to 
celebrate the Pifth of November without a 
guy.” 

Again she shot a glance of dubiety at him. 
“ I don’t know in the least how to take that,” 
she confessed, with a quiver on her lip. 



70 


March Hares, 


He laughed outright at this, and gaily 
patted her on the shoulder. “ This unnatural 
Attic levity of mine is all the fault of the 
frieze. I’m a cat in a strange garret here. 
Hasten with me to the Assyrian rooms, if you 
want to see the utmost height of solemnity it 
is given to mortals to attain.” 

He was not quite as good as his word, 
when they began loitering along before the 
carved tablets from Nineveh and Khorsabad. 
Instruction he could not help piling upon his 
companion, for this was his subject, but he 
found himself seasoning it with all sorts of 
sprightly commentaries on the serious text. 
Of grave and sportive alike he had so much to 
say that Vestalia took his arm, and leant upon 
it as they made their slow progress through 
the long corridors. The contact was exhilarat¬ 
ing to him. He could not be sure that she 
was assimilating any large proportion of his 
discourse, but her pretence of interest at least 
was very pretty, and the touch of her arm in 
his was full of inspiration to his tongue. 

Down in the basement, or crypt, he stood 



March Hares, 


71 


before the lions of Assur-Banipal, and talked 
at length. She said she had read Byron’s 
“ Sardanapalus,” and he told her how those 
detestable linguists, the Greeks, had altered 
the name, and how the Assyrian legends of a 
great warrior and sovereign had become twist¬ 
ed in the Hellenic after-version to depict a 
sublimation of debauched effeminacy and lux¬ 
ury run mad. She listened with her shoulder 
against his—but now he had other auditors 
as well. 

“ Excuse me, sir,” the urgent and anxious 
voice of a stranger said close behind him, 
“but you seem to be extraordinarily well 
posted indeed on these sculptures here. I 
hope you will not object to my daughter 
and me standing where we can hear your 
remarks.” 

Mosscrop turned, and saw before him an 
elderly man, with a mild expression, and hair 
and beard of extreme whiteness. He was 
soberly attired, and carried in his hand a 
broad-brimmed hat of woven white straw. 
He bowed courteously, and indicated by a 



72 


March 


gentle gesture the young lady standing at 
liis side. 

“ I should delight, sir, to have my daughter 
be privileged to profit by your remarks,” he 
repeated, and bowed again. 

The daughter was a dark, well-rounded 
girl, dressed with much elegance. Her face 
was strikingly Oriental in type, with coal-black 
tresses drawn low over the temples, and a skin 
of a uniform ivory hue. She said nothing, 
but looked at Vestalia’s hair. 

Mosscrop spoke somewhat abruptly. “ You 
are certainly welcome, but it happens that I 
have finished my remarks, as you call them.” 

“That is too bad,” replied the stranger, 
with a sigh of resignation. “I overheard 
enough to convince me that they were first- 
rate. It is our misfortune, sir, mine and my 
daughter’s, to have arrived too late. I pre¬ 
sume, sir, that you have given special attention 
to this branch of study ? ” 

The Professor of Culdees nodded briefly. 

“ And may I take the liberty of inquiring, 
sir,” the old man persisted, “whether you 



Ma/rch Ha/res. 


73 


are professionally engaged in transmitting to 
others the knowledge which you have thus 
acquired ? ” 

A stormy grin began twitching at the cor¬ 
ners of Mosscrop’s mouth. He nodded again. 

“My purpose in putting the question is 
not one of idle curiosity, sir,” the other went 
on. “ My life-long desire to visit Europe, and 
behold its venerable ruins and its remarkable 
accumulations of objects of historical and 
artistic interest, has attained fulfilment at a 
period, unfortunately, when the burden of my 
years, while not incapacitating me from the 
enjoyments of the mind, renders me less ca¬ 
pable of searching out new information than 
I should once have been. It also, I see only 
too clearly, unfits me to act as a guide and 
interpreter, amid these treasures of the storied 
past, to a young mind so much fresher and 
more eager than my own. I recognise this, 
sir, frankly, and I should be glad to discuss 
some possible arrangement, with the proper 
persons, by which my deficiencies might be 
supplied in this connection.” 



74 


March Ha/res, 


The elaborate and deferential courtesy 
with which the old gentleman spoke made a 
curt answer impossible. Mosscrop looked 
from father to daughter with a puzzled smile. 

“You are Americans, I take it?” 

“We are from Paris, sir.” He made haste 
to add, “From Paris, Kentucky. I obtrude 
the explanation, because I find that among 
foreigners there is frequently a tendency to 
confuse our city with the celebrated me¬ 
tropolis on the Continent, which bears the 
same name, but is a place of an entirely 
different character. To a scholar like your¬ 
self, however, I might have realised that such 
an error would be impossible. I ask your 
pardon, sir.” 

“ Oh, don’t mention it,” replied Mosscrop, 
lightly. He could not recall ever having 
heard of such a place before, and for a 
moment was tempted to say so. But there 
was an effect of sweet simplicity in the old 
man’s face and manner which restrained his 
tongue. “ Well,” he said instead, “ what is it 
that you wish? I am not sure that I have 



Ma/rch Ha/res, 


75 


entirely caught your idea. Do you want some 
one to go round with you and show you 
things?” 

“ Not in the ordinary meaning which 
would attach to that description,” the other 
answered. “ We do not require to have things 
shown to us in the literal sense of the word, 
hut I had thought that if we were attended 
in our inspection of the various objects of 
interest for which Europe is justly famous, 
by some person of erudition and also of an 
exceptional style of delivery, the experience 
would be of much greater practical value to 
my daughter. Of course, sir, I am aware that 
professional assistance of this high character 
is not to be obtained without commensurate 
compensation, but that is a consideration 
which presents no obstacles to my mind.” 

David felt Vestalia’s hand trembling upon 
his arm. 

“ I can see,” he said, more an iably, “ that 
such a relation might be extremely welcome 
to many deserving and very capable men. 

But at the moment I regret to say I can 
6 



76 


March Hares. 


think of none to recommend to you. Besides, 
you don’t know me from Adam; so how 
could I give a character to any one else ? ” 

“ I beg your pardon sir,” rejoined the old 
gentleman, “but we took the liberty of fol¬ 
lowing close behind you all through the last 
two long hallways. You were apparently so 
engrossed with your subject that our prox¬ 
imity escaped your attention, but we have 
listened with the deepest interest, and I may 
say improvement as well, to everything which 
has fallen from your lips. I have thus, sir, 
been able to form an estimate of your individ¬ 
ual characteristics not less than of your ac¬ 
quirements. I may add, sir, that I am espe¬ 
cially impressed by the fact that my daughter, 
from first to last, displayed an exceptional 
eagerness to miss nothing of your discourse. 
As the principal object of my visit to Europe, 
as, indeed, of my whole existence, is to 
provide the highest forms of intellectual 
pleasure and edification for my daughter, I 
cannot close my eyes to the discovery that 
your remarks upon Assyrian history produced 



March Hares. 


77 


a much more profound impression upon her 
young mind than anything which it has been 
within the scope of my own diminishing 
powers to produce for her consideration. I 
have rarely seen her so absorbed, even at our 
best lectures.” 

David stifled a yawn, and made a little 
bow in which, as he turned, he strove to 
include the young American lady whose 
culture was the object of so much solicitude. 
His movement surprised upon her coun¬ 
tenance an expression of scornful weariness, 
which seemed to render the whole face alert 
and luminous with feeling. At sight of his 
eyes, her sultana-like features composed them¬ 
selves again to an almost stolid tranquillity. 
She regarded him with indolence for an 
instant, then looked calmly away at things in 
general. There was to be read in that tran¬ 
sient glance a challenge which stirred his blood. 

“ Well, what you say is, beyond doubt, 
flattering,” he remarked to the father, in a 
slightly altered voice. “It might be that— 
that I could find some one for you.” 



78 


Ma/rch Ha/res, 


The old gentleman bowed ceremoniously. 
“ Permit me to say, sir, that I have found the 
some one—a person possessing unique quali¬ 
fications for the position which I have out¬ 
lined. I need nothing now but the power to 
infiuence his decision in a manner favourable 
to my aspirations.” He turned to Yestalia. 
“I am emboldened, madame, to crave your 
assistance in reconciling your husband to my 
project.” 

Vestalia’s hand fluttered sharply on 
David’s arm, and she parted her lips to 
speak. At the moment, there was audible 
a derisive sniff from the daughter. 

“ It is my rule never to interfere,” Yestalia 
answered with sudden decision, and in a 
coldly distinct voice. “He is quite capable 
of settling such matters for himself.” She 
looked from father to daughter and back with 
an impressive eye. 

Mosscrop laughed uneasily. “Well—I’m 
afraid you must take it that this is settled—I 
scarcely see my way to avail myself of your 
very complimentary offer.” 



March Ha/res, 


79 


The American caught the note of hesita¬ 
tion in his voice. “ Perhaps you will turn it 
over in your mind,” he said, fumbling with a 
hand in his inner breast-pocket. “ Allow me, 
sir, to hand you my card. Adele, you have a 
pencil ? Thank you. I will inscribe upon it 
the name of the hotel at which we are 
residing.” 

Mosscrop took the card, glanced at it, 
and nodded. “ In the extremely improb¬ 
able event of my changing my mind, I will 
let you know,” he said. “ Good day.” 

As they were parting, the father seemed to 
read in the daughter’s eye that he was forget¬ 
ting something. He hesitated for a brief 
space; then his kindly face brightened. 
“ Excuse me, sir,” he observed, “ but I have 
neglected to inform myself as to your identity 
—if I may presume to that extent.” 

David felt vainly in his pocket. “ I 
haven’t a card with me. My name is David 
Mosscrop. The Barbary Club will find me. 
I will write it for you.” 

The old man scrutinized the scrawl in his 



80 


March Hares. 


note-book, and then, after more bows, led his 
daughter away. She walked after him in a 
proudly indifferent fashion, with her head in 
the air, and something almost like a swagger 
in the movements of her form. 

Mosscrop watched them with a ruminating 
eye till they had left the room. Then he 
glanced at the card, and gave a little laugh. 
“ Mr. Laban Skinner, Paris, Kentucky.— 
Savoy Hotel,” he read aloud. 

“Skinner? Is their name Skinner?” 
demanded Vestalia with eagerness. 

“Hone other. Why? It’s a good name 
for them, isn’t it ? ” 

“ Oh yes—good enough,” the girl replied, 
speaking now with exaggerated noncha¬ 
lance. 

“ Quaint people these Americans are! ” 
commented Mosscrop. “ If I were to put 
that old chap’s speeches down literally in a 
book nobody would credit them. Fancy the 
fate of a young woman condemned to be 
dragged around the globe chained to a 
preposterous old phonograph like that! It 



March Hares, 


81 


really wrings one’s heart to think of it. 
Mighty good-looking girl too.” 

Vestalia withdrew her arm. “Perhaps,” 
she said, icily, “ if you were to make haste you 
might overtake them. I must insist on your 
not allowing me to detain you, if you are so 
interested. I shall do quite well by myself.” 

Mosscrop gathered her meaning slowly, 
after a grave scrutiny of her flushed and 
perturbed face. When it came to him, he 
shouted his merriment. A glance around the 
chamber showed him that they were alone 
with the lions and carved effigies of Sardanapa- 
lus. He thrust an arm about Yestalia’s waist, 
and gave it a boisterous though fleeting squeeze. 

“Why, you dear little canary-bird of a 
creature, do you suppose I’ve been forgetting 
you ? ” he cried. “ Haven’t I been thinking 
every minute of the touch of your arm in 
mine ? Haven’t I been cursing that old wind¬ 
bag ceaselessly because he was interrupting 
our birthday ? Look up at me! Truly now, 
aren’t you ashamed ? ” 

She suffered him to raise her face, his 



82 


March Ha/res, 


finger under her chin, and she made a brave 
effort to smile back at the glance he bent 
upon her. “ If it is truly—oh, ever so truly— 
still our birthday—the same as it was before,” 
she made wistful answer. 

“ It is a hundred times more our birthday 
than ever! ” he protested stoutly. 

An elderly keeper in uniform shuffled his 
way into the room. 

“ Well then,” whispered Vestalia, “let’s go 
somewhere else to celebrate the rest of it. All 
these stone animals and images and mummies 
—I don’t feel as if they brought me luck on 
my birthday.” 

So they wandered forth into the sunshine 
again, and Mosscrop confessed himself glad 
of the change. Where should they go ? He 
found himself empty of suggestion. Eespon- 
sibility for the decorous entertainment of a 
young lady in the daytime was a novel experi¬ 
ence, and he said so. 

“ Oh, let us just stroll about,” she urged. 
“ I love these old Bloomsbury Squares. They 
are so stupid.” 



March Hares. 


83 


Luncheon hour came, and presented itself 
to Mosscrop as a welcome pretext to take 
a hansom. A certain formless apprehension 
of meeting some one he knew—though why 
this should be dreaded he could not for the 
life of him have told—had alloyed the 
pleasure of his ramble. They drove to 
another restaurant, this time a larger place 
in a more pretentious quarter—and though 
they had a little table to themselves, the 
room was full of others. 

David knew about luncheons as well as 
breakfasts. He gave the waiter very minute 
instructions about having a grouse split and 
grilled, and he ran his eye over the list of 
champagnes with the confident discrimination 
of an expert. “ I will give that number 34a 
one more trial,” he said to the butler. “ Cool 
it to 48, and we will see what it is like then.” 

Vestalia noted that he spoke to waiters 
in a soft, grave tone, with shades of gentle 
melancholy and of affectionate authority 
subtly blended in it, which he used to no one 
else. He produced the impression upon her 



84 


March Ha/res, 


of being at his very best at a table. She 
particularly liked him when he took the 
cork from the butler, and tenderly pinched 
with thumb and finger as he scrutinised it, 
and then smiled courteous approbation to the 
servant. This person wore a chain round his 
neck, and the bottle he brought was swathed 
in starched napery—and the girl observed 
both with the interest that attaches to nov¬ 
elty. But it was even more interesting to see 
how perfectly her companion presided over 
everything. 

She herself was much less at ease. David 
noticed that she kept her hands in her lap 
under the table as much as possible during 
the meal, and that there was an air of con¬ 
straint in her general deportment which had 
been lacking at breakfast. He put it down 
to her shyness among so many busy people 
in the thronged apartment, and talked briskly 
at intervals to re-assure her. Especially he 
charged himself with the duty of keeping her 
glass filled, and he was almost peremptory in 
his tone with her about the grouse. She ate 



March Ma/res. 


85 


her piece to the end with meek resolution 
after that. 

When they were again in the open, he 
rallied her upon the diffidence she had dis¬ 
played. “ You mustn’t mind a lot of fellows 
being about,” he said in a paternal way. 
“They go where there is the best kitchen, 
and it’s the part of wisdom to go there too; 
besides, they’re only too pleased to see a pretty 
face among them. Didn’t you feel how proud 
I was of you, all the while ? ” 

Outside she had quite regained her spirits 
and assurance. She smiled with frank gaiety 
at him. “I’ll tell you how to be prouder 
still,” she said. “ I know you won’t mind my 
saying so—hut I ought really to have some 
gloves.” 

“ I’m a brute not to have thought of it,” 
Mosscrop reproached himself. “ Here’s a 
place, just at hand. I can come in, this time, 
I suppose, without question.” 

She held up a finger at him, in mock mo¬ 
nition. Then, as they turned to enter the 
shop, she whispered: “ I saw that American 




86 


Ma/rch Ha/res. 


girl looking with all her eyes at my bare 
hands.” 

“Oh, pshaw—lots of women don’t wear 
gloves. You mustn’t be so suspicious of 
everybody that looks your way. A hundred 
to one they’re thinking about themselves all 
the time.” 

“Ah, but you don’t know women,” she 
halted midway in the entrance to murmur. 
“ I could read it in her eyes that she’d noticed 
I had no ring.” 

“ Well, and there too,” protested Mosscrop, 
“ you exaggerate the importance of the thing. 
Lots of women don’t wear rings, either—that 
is, on ordinary occasions.” 

She danced her eyes at him in merriment. 
“ Perhaps you didn’t notice that I was sup¬ 
posed to be a married lady,” she said, and then 
turned abruptly to the counter. 




CHAPTER V. 

“ Ah me! Even the longest and happiest 
day must have an ending! ” sighed Vestalia. 

“ It is not a new thought,” replied David. 
“ But I have never before comprehended how 
unwelcome it could make itself.” 

They spoke to each other in soft, regret¬ 
ful, musing tones, through the still darkness 
of the clouded summer night. They had been 
the last to quit the Greenwich boat, on its last 
return to its City moorings, and they halted 
for a moment on the floating pier after the 
others had gone—the gentle undulation of the 
tide beneath their feet, their gaze dwelling 
upon the black silent expanse of the river. 

In retrospect, the day had been very long 
indeed, and altogether happy. Its structure 
of delight had been reared on the simplest and 

87 


88 


March Ha/res, 


most innocent of foundations. They had gone 
first to the Zoological Garden, which fortu¬ 
itously suggested itself to Mosscrop’s mental 
search as an unexceptional resource. Nor did 
inspiration fail him there, for when the great 
man-eating cats had been fed, and the foul 
hyenas next door had yelped themselves 
hoarse, and the charms of natural history had 
otherwise begun to wane, the notable thought 
of the fish dinner at Greenwich rose with 
splendid opportuneness in his mind. 

It was after this feast, while the two 
strolled beneath the big trees, that twilight 
found them out. The shadows, as they deep¬ 
ened among the distant shipping, and stole 
downward to dim the reflected whiteness of 
the eastern sky beyond the river, brought rev¬ 
erie in their train. Mosscrop found a bitter 
taste in his cigar, and lit another impatiently. 
The girl leant upon his arm with a new sug¬ 
gestion of dependence. They moved down to 
the wharf by tacit consent, before the ap¬ 
pointed time, and, taking their seat on a bench 
at the end, looked absently at the water with 



March Hares. 


89 


but an occasional word. Evening closed in 
about them as they sat thus. Then the boat 
came, and they went on board, and established 
themselves in relative seclusion at the stern, 
still in almost unbroken silence. 

And now the completed journey lay behind 
them as well. They stood close together, 
swaying with the slight motion of the raft 
upon the lapping waters, and ruminating 
sadly upon the fact that their day was done. 

“We finish as we began—with the river,” 
murmured Yestalia. She trembled to his 
touch as she spoke. 

“ Do you remember Henley’s lines,” said 
David, meditatively— 

“ ‘ The smell of ships (that earnest of romance), 

A sense of space and water, and thereby 
A lamplit bridge ouching the troubled sky. 

And look, 0 look! a tangle of silvery gleams, 

And dusky lights, our River and all his dreams. 
His dreams of a dead past that cannot die.’ ” 

“No, it cannot die,” said Vestalia, slowly. 
“ But its burial time is close at hand, none the 
less. Ah, the beautiful day! ” 



90 


March Ha/res, 


They turned and paced up the ascent, and 
then through obscure, deserted thoroughfares 
made their way at length to the open space 
about St. Paul’s. The clouds had parted, and 
the great dome loomed in immensity against a 
straggling light from the sky. They paused 
to look at it, and while they stood the fleecy 
mists far overhead cleared away, and the 
round moon’s full radiance flooded the pros¬ 
pect. Mosscrop gazed up at the flaring satel¬ 
lite, then down at his companion. A new 
thought sparkled in his eyes. 

“ And ah, the beautiful to-morrow, too! ” 
he said, confldently. “ My good child, do you 
conceive that the world comes to an end when 
the sun goes down ? Am I less your friend by 
moonlight than I was in the day-time ? Are 
we changed by the fact that the lamps are 
lit?” 

Yestalia turned her face into the shadow, 
and said nothing. Mosscrop felt her deep 
breathing against his arm. 

“ You have been very dutiful and obedient 
all day,” he began, as they moved along to- 



March Ha/res, 


91 


ward Ludgate Hill. “ I repudiate the sugges¬ 
tion that you are capable of mutiny now. Let 
us speak plainly, dear little lady. How can you 
suppose that, having watched over you all day 
and gladly made myself responsible for your 
well-being since before breakfast, I could wash 
my hands of you now, and calmly say ‘ good¬ 
bye ’ at a street corner ? ” 

“ You have been very very kind,” faltered 
Vestalia. 

“And for that reason it follows that I 
should be very callous and brutal now, does 
it ? I don’t see the logic myself.” 

“ I haven’t meant that at all,” she inter¬ 
posed in a low voice. She bent her head so 
that Mosscrop could not see her face. 

“We will develop and analyze your mean¬ 
ings at our leisure,” he said, with a note of 
authority. “ It is more important for the mo¬ 
ment to make clear what I mean. The facts 
are simplicity itself. You have no home, no 
belongings, no place to sleep, no knowledge 
of where the morning’s breakfast is to come 

from. You are a beautiful girl, and it is true 
7 



92 


Ma/rch Hares, 


our civilisation is so arranged that beautiful 
girls rarely starve to death. I do not recall 
having heard of a single instance, for that 
matter. But your position makes an impera¬ 
tive demand for assistance from somebody. 
It cried aloud for help at an early hour this 
morning. It happened that the appeal was 
heard and answered. If we were superstitious, 
we should call it providential.’’ 

“ Oh, but I do! ” protested the girl. 

“Very well, then, we are superstitious, and 
it was providential. These things are gov¬ 
erned, I am informed, by immutable laws. 
Ergo, it is still providential. Who are we, 
that we should fly in the face of Providence ? 
I adjure you to put away such impious 
thoughts! ” 

A little sobbing catch of the breath was 
her only answer. He divined that there were 
tears in her eyes, and slowed his pace as they 
walked along in the gloom of the deserted 
descent. At the bottom, under the bridge, 
the sparkling lights of Fleet Street recalled 
to him that shops were still open. 



March Ha/res, 


93 


“ I mentioned that you had no belongings,” 
he resumed, after they had traversed the Cir¬ 
cus in silence. “There are little odds and 
ends of things that you want—the necessities 
of the toilet, et cetera. Here is a shop; take 
this sovereign and get the bits of haberdash¬ 
ery that occur to you—such as a lady would 
put in her dressing-bag if she were to stop 
overnight in the country. I will go across the 
way and get the bag itself, and come back for 
you.” 

He performed his part of the enterprise 
with an almost childlike delight. Ladies’ 
dressing-bags cost more than he had imag¬ 
ined, but the shopman said he would take a 
cheque. David found something to his mind 
—a dainty yet capacious trifle, with pretty sil¬ 
ver flasks ranged on one side, and a surpris¬ 
ingly comprehensive collection of small imple¬ 
ments—scissors, curling-tongs, a manicure set, 
and other tools the signiflcance of which he 
could not even guess—packed about in quaint 
little pockets and crevices. The outer leather 
was rich to the eye and delicate to the touch. 



94 


March Hares, 


A few doors away shone the symbolical 
red and blue lights of a chemist. Hurrying 
thither, he flung himself eagerly into the task 
of buying fluids to All those imposing flasks. 
The shopman advised him, at flrst coldly, then 
with rising enthusiasm. The best perfumes 
and vinaigres were expensive, certainly, but 
then they were the best, and would vouch for 
themselves to any cultivated feminine mind. 
There were recondite soaps, and cosmetics to 
thrill any gentle heart. And in the matter of 
brushes—here were some silver-backed, and 
the comb also—to match the flasks^ So the 
list was fllled out, and David wrote another 
cheque with a proud smile. 

Yestalia stood at the door of the shop, 
waiting with a small paper parcel in her 
hands. Mosscrop was disappointed at its size, 
and thrust it into the bag with a disdainful 
shove. They strolled on up the street, and he 
looked into every lighted window with a hope¬ 
ful eye. The display of mere masculine or 
neutral wares affronted him. The shopping 
fantasy possessed his soul. 



March Hares, 


95 


“ But you really ought to have them. 
You’re not behaving nicely to me in continu¬ 
ally saying ‘ no,’ ” he urged more than once, 
as the pressure of his companion’s arm drew 
him away from the tempting windows. She 
did consent at last to the purchase of some 
slippers—and he saw to it that they were the 
choicest that the shelves afforded—soft, luxu¬ 
rious little things, with satin linings and 
buckles of mother-of-pearl. When these went 
into the hag, it was filled. He recognised the 
fact with a regretful sigh. 

The ‘ creaking old clock-machinery in the 
belfry of St. Clement Danes set itself in mo¬ 
tion as they passed, and the ancient chimes 
clanged out the full hour. It was nine o’clock. 

“ I had some thought of a music-hall,” he 
remarked. “ But we’ve had a pretty full day 
—and a long day, too. I know you must be 
tired.” 

“ Perhaps—just a little,” she answered, 
softly. 

“ Then we’ll go home,” he said, with de¬ 
cision. 



96 


March Ha/res. 


It was not a part of London which Vestalia 
knew very well. Mosscrop led her along the 
Strand for a little way, then crossed and went 
up a side street, then turned into a still nar¬ 
rower by-way. The ragged loungers on the 
walk had an evil aspect, and almost every 
building seemed to be a public-house. At the 
last corner a piano-organ of unusual volume 
shook the air with deafening mechanical din. 
The man turned the crank so fast, and the 
dancing children in the radiance from the 
open-doored tavern on the pavement raised 
such a racket of their own, that she could 
barely distinguish the movement of the vulgar 
tune. On the borders of darkness beyond 
were discernible still other children, playing 
noisily about at the base of groups of fat 
women in fog-coloured shawls and white 
aprons. Over all the tumult and squalid clus¬ 
terings of humanity there brooded the acrid, 
musty stench of an antique mid-London slum. 

The two turned under an archway, and as 
by magic the atmosphere freshened and the 
hubbub ceased. A small square of venerable 



March Hares, 


97 


buildings disclosed itself vaguely in the uncer¬ 
tain light from the sky. Here and there a 
lamp behind some curtained window made a 
dim break in the obscurity. The faint sweet 
moaning of a ’cello rose from somewhere at 
the farther end of the space. A stout man 
with a gold band upon his tall hat revealed 
himself for a noiseless moment, lifted his fin¬ 
ger in salute to Mosscrop, and melted away 
again into the shadows. Whether they had 
passed him, or he them, Vestalia could hardly 
tell. It was all very strange—and a little 
sombre. A streak of moonlight glanced down 
between shifting clouds, and fell across the 
fronts of the houses opposite. There were 
pale grey tablets of ornamentation set into 
their mass of dusky brickwork, which looked 
like tombstones. The girl trembled, and hung 
back upon Mosscrop’s arm as if to halt. 

Suddenly, after a brief preliminary scale 
of piano notes, a woman’s clear, practised 
voice fell upon the silence in a song—a 
grave and simple melody full of tenderness. 
They paused to listen for an instant, and 



98 


March Hares, 


Vestalia traced the sound to an illuminated 
upper floor at the end of the square. 

“ Then people live here ! ” she said, with 
hesitating re-assurance in her voice. 

“ Bless you, yes,” replied David. “ We 
live here, among others.” 

He entered the open doorway of the house 
next to that before which they had paused. 
The hall was lighted by a single gas-jet at the 
rear, which only deepened the darkness of the 
narrow staircase up which he led the way. It 
was a very ancient and ricketty staircase, with 
steps worn into queer bumps and hollows by 
generations of feet. There was not room for 
her to walk abreast of her guide. He strode 
ahead, striking matches on the wall as he 
went. She followed him timorously up the 
winding ascent, noting the rows of names 
painted on the big closed doors of each land¬ 
ing they passed. 

Mosscrop stopped only when the stairs 
came to an end. He put down the bag, and 
she heard the rattle of a key in a lock. Then 
a match was struck, and a sudden flare of 



March Hares, 


99 


gas lit up the small square hall-way they 
stood in. 

As he pushed open a door to the left, he 
turned with a smiling face towards his com¬ 
panion. He discovered her drawn hack at 
the edge of the stairs, her hands pressed 
against her bosom. Her eyes were fastened 
on him with a troubled look, and the sound of 
her breathing, quick and laboured, reached 
his ears. 

“ These stairs are the very deuce when 
you’re not used to them,” he said, pleasantly. 
“ I oughtn’t to have rushed you up them at 
such a pace.” 

“ That doesn’t matter,” panted the girl. 
“ It is I who oughtn’t to have come up at 
all.” 

David’s smile deepened and mellowed as 
he regarded her. “ My dear Vestalia,” he be¬ 
gan, laying a slight and kindly stress upon 
this first use of her name, “ you speak hastily. 
You must offer no further remarks until you 
have quite recovered your breath. I will em¬ 
ploy the interval by calling your attention to 



100 


March Hares, 


the inscription on the closed door, there, op¬ 
posite to mine. You will observe that it is 
‘ Mr. Linkhaw.’ Have you ever heard it be¬ 
fore?” 

She shook her head. 

“ And are you conscious of no novel emo¬ 
tions at hearing it now ? Does not the sight 
of those painted letters cause you to thrill 
with strange and mysterious sensations? Ho? 
What becomes then of the boasted intuition 
of the feminine mind ? ” 

There seemed to be a jest hidden some¬ 
where in all this, and she smiled plaintively, 
dubiously. She took her hand from her 
breast, to show that her breathing was calmer. 

“ You really assure me,” he went on, with 
a twinkling eye, “ that the spectacle of this 
particular sported-oak does not especially stir 
your pulses, and peculiarly impress your im¬ 
agination ? ” 

“ Why should it ? ” 

“Why indeed! Ah, young woman, your 
sex gets much credit that it ill deserves. A 
mere man could do no worse in the matter of 



March Hares, 


101 


instinct. My dear friend, behind that door 
lies your present abode. That name ‘ Link- 
haw ’ is the sign of your home—and you 
looked at them both and never guessed 
it! ” 

Vestalia did not so much as glance at the 
door in question, but she gazed with much in¬ 
tentness at Mosscrop. “ I don’t understand— 
what it is all about ? ” she said, slowly. 

He had stepped inside his own door, 
lighted the gas and pulled down the blinds. 
He returned, and stretched out his hand to 
take hers. “Do me the honour to come in 
and sit down,” he said, holding up her gloved 
fingers, and bowing over them. “ You are my 
nearest neighbour, and yet you have never 
called upon me.” 

She followed him into his sitting-room, 
and took the easy chair he wheeled out toward 
the table for her. It was a larger apartment 
than the narrow staircase and cramped land¬ 
ing had promised. The ceiling was low and 
dreadfully smoky, it was true, and the appoint¬ 
ments and furniture were old-fashioned. But 



102 


March Ha/res, 


the whole effect, if somewhat meagre and un¬ 
adorned, was comfortable and honest. 

“ Put off your hat and gloves, and look as 
if you felt at home,” urged David. “ You’ve 
but a step to go.” 

He busied himself meanwhile in bringing 
from a recess of the sideboard two tumblers, a 
heavy decanter filled with an amber liquid, 
and a big bottle of soda water. 

“You’ll join me in some whisky and 
soda?” he asked pleasantly, fumbling with 
the wire. 

“ Oh mercy, no! ” said Yestalia. “ Really 
I mustn’t touch anything more. I see now 
that I have been drinking far too much, all 
day long.” 

“ Tut! ” he answered. “ How could there 
be too much on a birthday? And now I 
think of it, there were two of them! I pledge 
my word, it has been a singularly dry occasion 
for a double birthday. We must hasten to 
make good the deficiency.” 

Vestalia had drawn off her gloves. She 
rose now, and standing before the mantel-mir- 



March Hares, 


103 


ror, lifted her hat from her head. Then she 
turned and, half-playfully, half in pleading, 
shook her bright curls at him. “ I thought it 
was going to be different hereafter,” she said, 
softly. 

He looked inquiry for an instant, then 
nodded comprehension. “ Ay,” he said, with 
gravity, “ you’re a wise virgin. This one glass 
shall last me the night. You are very wel¬ 
come here, my lady! ” 

She smiled at the lifted tumbler, over 
which his eyes regarded her. “ What lots of 
books you have!” she exclaimed, a moment 
later, and began an inspection of the room, 
lingering in turn before each of the old prints 
on the dingy walls, and examining the rows of 
volumes in detail. He loitered beside her for 
a little, passing comments on what seemed to 
interest her. Then he disappeared in an ad¬ 
joining room, and returned presently in a loose 
velveteen jacket and slippers. He took the 
famous dressing-bag from the table. 

“ Your visit isn’t at all over yet,” he re¬ 
marked ; “ but I am consumed with a desire to 



104 


March Hares, 


see you sitting opposite me, here, in those wee 
soft slippers of yours. It will make a sweet 
picture for me to carry into dreamland. And 
so first I will show you your new home.” 

She followed him out into the hall, and 
then through the doors he unlocked into the 
apartments of the mysterious “ Mr. Linkhaw.” 
The first room disclosed itself, when the gas 
was lit, to be similar to David’s in size, but all 
else was strangely different. The Turkey red 
carpet was brilliant, almost garish, in its new¬ 
ness, and the ceiling was covered with a bright 
pink paper. All round three sides were broad 
divans, heaped with soft red cushions and 
downy pillows. No chairs were to be seen. 
More singular still, the walls were crowded 
with the stuffed heads of animals—bisons, 
bears, moose, elks, antelopes, wolves, and end¬ 
less varieties of deer. Vestalia gazed at these 
trophies of the chase with surprise. 

“ Linkhaw is a mighty hunter before the 
Lord,” Mosscrop explained. “ Yon is the bed¬ 
room. It is fairly carpeted with the skins of 
tigers, lions, leopards, and such like beasts. If 



Ma/rch Hares. 


105 


you dream of jungles and Noah’s ark to-night, 
and don’t like it, we’ll throw them all out in 
the morning.” 

“ But what am I doing in this Mr. Link- 
haw’s rooms ? ” inquired the girl. “ I don’t 
understand it at all. Suppose he should 
come ? ” 

David laughed lightly. “It’s a far cry 
from Uganda to Dunstan’s Inn. Or maybe 
he’s in the Hudson Bay Territory. It’s a year 
and more since I knew of his whereabouts. 
The most unheard-of and God-forgotten 
wilderness on earth—that’s where you may 
always count on his being, unless he has 
learned of some still more impossible and re¬ 
pellent wild, just discovered, in the meantime. 
He is an old friend and school-fellow of mine, 
and leaves his keys with me. I just have a 
look at the place now and then, to keep the 
laundress up to the mark.” 

He passed on into the bedroom, struck a 
light, and threw a scrutinising glance round. 
“ You’ll be needing fresh sheets and the like,” 
he said, returning. “ I’ll bring them.” 



106 


Ma/rch Hares, 


He came back with an armful of linen, and 
heaped it on the bed. “ How you’re right as 
a trivet,” he cried, cheerily. “ Everything has 
been aired. And now I’ll be waiting for you 
to come back to me, with the pretty little 
slippers. Mind, I’m capable of great excesses 
in drink if you delay over-long.” 

Vestalia’s delay was inconsiderable. They 
sat for an hour or more, she with the dainty 
new footgear on the fender, he, lounging low 
in his chair, stretching out his own feet close 
to the rail beside hers. “ I could wish it were 
winter,” he mused, once, “so that we might 
have a fire. We have an old saying about two 
pairs of slippers on the hearth. I never 
thought before what homely beauty there was 
in it. Ah, there’ll be cool nights coming on 
now, and then we’ll start a blaze. But even 
with a black grate, it is the dearest evening of 
my life.” 

“ And of mine,” responded the girl. 

Hours later, David still sat by the empty 
fireplace, and ruminated over his pipe. He 
had put the decanter and glass resolutely back 



Ma/rch Hares, 


107 


into the sideboard, and turned a key on them. 
He had taken down a book, but it lay unre¬ 
garded on the floor beside him. He desired to 
do nothing but think, and yet even that it was 
not easy to contrive. Thoughts would not 
marshal themselves in any ordered sequence. 

The whole day had yielded an extraordinary 
experience, involving all thoughts of moment¬ 
ous possibilities, which he said over and over 
again to himself demanded the coolest and 
most conservative consideration. But when 
he strove to fasten his mind to the task, 
straightway it swerved and curveted and 
danced off beyond control. One memory re¬ 
turned to him ceaselessly: the way Vestalia had 
risen Anally to say good-night, and insisted 
strenuously on his not quitting his chair, and 
then, all at once, had bent swiftly down and 
kissed him before she ran from the room. 
And well, why not ? he asked himself at last; 
why shouldn’t he abandon himself to remem¬ 
bering it? What else was there equally well 
worth recalling? The early morning on the 

bridge rose again before him; the tenderly 
8 



108 


March Hares, 


compassionate intimacy which, stealing slowly 
over them, seemed yet to have burst forth in 
ripe fulness from the very beginning; the de¬ 
lightful meals together, the long walks and 
talks, the little gifts which brought such hap¬ 
piness to the donor; the languorously sad¬ 
dened twilight on the river, the silent home¬ 
coming, the surprise, the kiss—so the sweet 
chain of reverie coiled and unfolded itself, 
with quickened heart-beats for links. 

Once a thought came to him—a thought 
which seemed hard and cold as his native 
granite, and rough with the bristling spikes of 
his own hillside heather—that he had spent in 
that one day more than his whole week’s in¬ 
come. In other times the fact would have 
disturbed David. Now he looked it calmly in 
the face, and smiled at it derisive dismissal. 
The savings of a year, or of four years—what 
were even they when weighed in the balance 
against the fact that next door, under these 
very roof-beams, the dear Vestalia was peace¬ 
fully sleeping? 

It must have been long after midnight 



Ma/rch Hares, 


109 


when, in the act of filling his pipe once more, 
it occurred to him to go to bed instead. Upon 
refiection, he was both tired and sleepy. He 
rose and yawned, and then smiled upon his 
own image in the mirror at remembering how 
happy he was as well. It was a queer mess, to 
be sure, but there was no element in it which 
he regretted or would have changed. It was 
all delicious, through and through. 

As he glanced again at his reflection in the 
glass, and warmed his heart by the flame of 
triumphant joy which gleamed through the 
eyes he looked into, a sudden rhythmical noise 
rose upon the profound stillness of the old 
inn. It caught his ear, and he turned to 
listen. 

“ It is that blessed creature snoring—breath¬ 
ing, I mean,” was his first thought. But no, 
it was in too rapid a measure for that. Then 
the sound waxed louder, and he recognised that 
it was of footsteps steadily ascending the stairs. 
“ The watchman, coming to make sure of the 
lights,” he thought, with re-assurance. 

But this hypothesis fell to the ground also. 



110 


Mmch Hares, 


The footsteps mounted to the landing close 
outside. The noise ceased, and then there 
came the unmistakable jingle of a key—nay, 
the very grating of it in the lock of the door 
opposite. 

David’s veins, for a confused moment, ran 
cold. Then, with an excited ejaculation, he 
ran to his door, and flung it open. 

“ Stop that, you idiot! ” he commanded, in 
muffled but ferocious tones. 

“ Ah, Davie, Davie! Still at the bottle! ” 
replied a well-known voice from out of the 
obscurity. 



CHAPTEE VI. 

Mossckop groaned at recognition of the 
voice in the dark. 

“ Of all inopportune creatures in the animal 
kingdom! ’’ he bewailed under his breath. 
“ Sh! for Heaven’s sake, man, don’t talk so 
loud. Come inside here, and walk softly.” 

“ What is it you’re stalking, Davie— 
snakes ? ” queried the newcomer, with obvious 
sarcasm. But he lowered his voice, and came 
forward into David’s room. The latter closed 
the door noiselessly, and drew a long sigh of 
consolation. The two men looked at each 
other for a minute in silence. 

“ You don’t mean that there are burglars in 
the house ? ” asked the intruder. A gleam of 
hopeful light shone in his eyes as he spoke, 
then died down at David’s shake of the head. 

Ill 


112 


March Hares, 


The Earl of Drumpipes, in the peerage of 
Scotland, was a year younger than his friend 
the Culdee Professor. The gaslight revealed 
him now to be a tall, burly, rubicund man, 
with a broad, strongly-marked face of a severe 
aspect. His yellowish hair was cut close over 
a head which seemed unduly large for even his 
powerful frame, and was thinning towards 
baldness on the top. The collar of a woollen 
shirt showed a good deal of his thick neck, 
burnt a bright red at the back by a fiercer sun 
than warms these British islands. His promi¬ 
nent blue eyes bulged forth more than ever, 
now, in mystified inspection of David’s coun¬ 
tenance. While he still gazed, it occurred to 
him to hold out his hand, as mighty as a black¬ 
smith’s, in perfunctory greeting, and David 
took it with an effusiveness which was novel 
to them both. 

“ I’m really delighted to see you, Archie. 
I give you my word lam!’’ he protested, eagerly. 

“ You have your own way of showing it,” 
growled the other. “Yet you seem sober 
enough. What ails you, man?” 




Ma/rch Ha/res, 


113 


“ Oh, the strangest story! ” said David. 
“ Sit down here, and I’ll get out the whisky.” 
He busied himself between the sideboard and 
table, talking as he did so, while the other 
sprawled his large bulk in one of the easy chairs 
and lit a pipe. 

“ See here, Drumpipes, damn it all,” he be¬ 
gan, “ I’m a gentleman, am I not ? ” 

You are a professional man, a person of 
education,” the Earl assented, cautiously. 

“Well, this is the first day in long years 
that I have felt like a gentleman.” 

“ You were ever a bit susceptible to hallu¬ 
cinations, Davie,” said the other. “ There’s a 
streak of unreality in your nature. Hold 
there! Not so much soda. I’m sore in need 
of a bath, I know; but everything at its proper 
time. Well, go on—how are you accounting 
for this extraordinary occurrence? You’ve 
felt all day like a gentleman! It arouses my 
curiosity.” 

“ Chuck that, Archie, or you’ll hear noth¬ 
ing at all.” 

“ Very well, my boy. I’ll just drink this. 



114 


March Hares, 


then, and go to my bed. It will be welcome, 
I can tell you.” 

He drained the tumbler, and made as if to 
rise. David hurled himself forward with a re¬ 
straining arm. “Don’t be an ass, old man! 
I’ve told you once, you mustn’t go near your 
place to-night,” he urged petulantly. “I’ll 
give you my bed, and I’ll sleep on the sofa 
here. It’s all right, I assure you. If you 
must know, there is somebody sleeping in your 
room.” 

The Earl frowned up at his friend. “ That 
was not in the bargain, Mosscrop,” he said, 
with sharpness. “ I don’t like it.” 

“ All I can say is,” retorted David, “ that 
if you’d been in my place you’d have done the 
same thing—or no, I’m not so sure about that; 
but under the circumstances it was the only 
thing I could do. It’s a young lady who is 
occupying your room, Drumpipes.” 

“ Aha 1 ” cried the Earl, “ let’s have her 
out! I’m not so sleepy as I thought. You 
can do something in the way of a supper, 
can’t you ? ” 



Ma/rch Ha/res, 


115 


“ No, I can’t, and if I could I wouldn’t. 
You misapprehend the situation entirely, my 

friend. This is a poor girl who-” and 

David went on and told, in brief fashion, the 
story of the day. 

“ Nine pounds odd your whistle cost you, 
eh, Davie?” was the listener’s comment, at 
the conclusion of the narrative. “ Well, each 
man has his own notion of what he wants for 
his money. It is not mine. I’ll say frankly. 
And what’s the programme for to-morrow? 
South Kensington Museum and Hampton 
Court? The next day you might do the 
Tower and Epping Forest. Then Westmin¬ 
ster Abbey and Kichmond—but you’ll come 
soon to the end of your rope. And sooner, 
still, I’m thinking, to the end of your banking 
account.” 

“ That’s my affair,” returned Mosscrop, 
testily. 

“ I might be said to have some small 
concern in the matter,” Drumpipes observed, 
“ seeing that I provide furnished lodgings for 
this beautiful experiment in combined philan- 



116 


March Ha/res, 


thropy and instruction. But you’re drink¬ 
ing nothing.” 

“ No; I had my one glass before you 
came. I’m taking care of myself these 
days.” 

“ And high time, too! ” admitted the can¬ 
did friend. “ I’ll not say you’ll not be the 
better for it.” 

“Well, and don’t you see?’’urged Moss- 
crop, with earnestness, “it’s just the fact of 
her being there yonder that makes it seem 
worth while to go to bed sober. It alters my 
whole conception of myself. It gives me en¬ 
tirely new ideas of what I ought to do. So 
long as I led this solitary life here there was 
nothing for me but to drink. But it’s differ¬ 
ent now.” 

The Earl grinned. “And how long will 
you be content to have this improving influ¬ 
ence radiated to you from across the pas¬ 
sage ? ” he asked, with cynicism. “ Supposing, 
of course, that I give up my rooms to the re¬ 
form-dynamo, so to speak.” 

“ Oh, of course, no one is asking that of 



Ma/rch Hares. 


117 


you. Obviously, your return makes other ar¬ 
rangements imperative.” 

“What will the other arrangements be 
like?” 

“ That remains to be seen. But I’m quite 
clear about one thing. I will not turn back 
from what I have undertaken. She shall not 
know what want is, and she shall be respected. 
I swear that, Drumpipes; and I want you to 
remember it.” 

“ Oh, I respect her immensely already,” 
said the Earl. “ By George, a girl must pos¬ 
sess extraordinary qualities who can come out 
early and catch a Professor of Culdees off her 
own bat, and work him for a tenner, and then 
leave him to forswear whisky on one side of a 
passage while she sleeps the sleep of the just 
in borrowed apartments on the other. It’s 
really splendid, old man. I take off my hat 
to her.” 

“Archie,” remarked David, slowly, “I’m 
smaller than you are, and no athlete, God 
knows; but if we have any more of that I 
will hit you in the eye, and chance it.” 



118 


March Hares* 


Drumpipes was amused at the notion, and 
chuckled. Then his face and voice lapsed 
into solemnity. “Davie,” he said, “I’ve no 
wish to vex you, hut it’s a bad business. 
You’ll not win your way through without 
much expense and soreness of heart. You 
can take that from me, who should know if 
any man does.” 

Mosscrop accepted the portentous gravity 
of the tone in good faith. He nodded, as he 
looked hard at his friend. “ Ay, I know,” he 
said, softly. “ But I have no despair, and few 
doubts about it all, Archie. I am very happy 
in the thought of going forward with it; so 
happy that I see I never knew what happi¬ 
ness meant before. And if—we’ll put it at 
the worst possible—if disappointment should 
come out of it, why, I shall already have had 
the joy. And even if it broke me, what 
would it matter? I should only be back 
again where I was yesterday, and no one on 
earth would be the worse for that. But with 
you it was different.” 

The Earl nodded in turn, and smoked his 




March Ha/res. 


119 


pipe. At last, without lifting his voice or dis¬ 
closing special interest in his news, he said, 
“ Man, she’s dead.” 

David’s eyes dilated. “What’s that—she 
—your wife, do you mean, is dead ? ” 

“ Ay, four months since,” replied the 
other quietly. 

Mosscrop came over and shook hands with 
his friend. “ I will take a drink with you, 
after that,” he said, and filled a glass. “ Tell 
me about it.” 

“ I know nothing about it—except that she 
is dead. That is enough, quite enough.” He 
lifted his tumbler. “Here’s to the heating 
arrangements in the warmest corner down 
below.” 

“A foul cat!” said David, with a harsh 
tremor in his voice, sipping the toast. 

“A very pretty woman,” answered the 
Earl, musingly. “ Hair like a new primrose, 
face like an earl Christian martyr, dearest 
little feet you ever imagined. You never saw 
her. You would have wanted to die for her 
on the spot. She would have made a single 



120 


March Ha/res, 


bite of you, my friend. I was a good deal 
tougher mouthful, but I got mangled more or 
less in the operation. These are the things 
that make one grateful for the religious in¬ 
fluences of childhood. I should be down¬ 
hearted just now if I were not able to believe 
in a Hell.” 

“ There is no doubt about the thing—she 
is really dead ? ” 

“ Dead as a mackerel, thank God. My 
lawyers certify to the blessed event. They 
ought to know. They have stood in the 
breach for four years, warding off writs, in¬ 
junctions, mandamuses, and appeals, with 
which she and the unscrupulous scoundrels, 
her solicitors, bombarded them. The costs 
those ancient parties must have charged up 
against me! Man, I’m fair frightened to go 
into the City and face them. There are three 
attempts at judicial separation, one divorce 
suit, two petitions for restoration of conjugal 
rights, three examinations of witnesses by 
commission, four appeals—the thought of 
those bills sickens me, Davie.” 



March Hares, 


121 


“ You’re well out of the noose at any 
cost.” 

“ Well, then, if your neck is free, keep it 
so, man! ” 

David smiled with gentle self-assurance. 

“Ah, laddie, if you could have seen the 
innocence of her. She drank Capri at break¬ 
fast, and then champagne at luncheon, and 
more of the same at dinner, with old tawny 
port on top of it—all as trustingly and con¬ 
fidingly as a babe. It softened one’s heart to 
see her lack of guile, her pretty inexperience.” 

The Earl sniffed audibly. “ Oh, ay, it’s a 
beautiful spectacle, no doubt, and very touch¬ 
ing. The pity is that magistrates will not 
always view it in that light next morning. 
But then so many things look different in the 
morning.” 

Again Mosscrop smiled. “ Save your 
moans, Archie,” he advised, “ till you see her 
yourself. You’ll meet the lady at breakfast.” 

“ I’m damned if I do,” said Drumpipes. 

“Now then, you’re talking like an idiot. 
You, a hunter of lions and crocodiles and 



122 


March Hares, 


wild asses of the desert, to turn tail and run 
from one wee yellow-headed lassie! and 
desert an old friend, moreover, who needs 
your advice, and judgment in the most im¬ 
portant matter of his life ! You know you’re 
flatly incapable of it.” 

“I’ll not promise to be civil to her if I 
stop,” the other growled. “ The mere thought 
of yellow-haired women is nauseating to me. 
Why on earth, man, if you must make a 
stark-staring lunatic of yourself, could you 
not hit on a decent and reputable colour ? ” 

“Never a dye has touched it,” protested 
David. “ It’s as natural as the sunshine—and 
as radiant.” 

“ Then you’re a ruined man, Davie,” the 
Earl gravely declared, between puffs at his 
pipe. “ There may be some saving quality in 
a woman who merely dyes her hair. An hon¬ 
est nature may persist beneath the painted 
wig, in spite of her endeavours. But if she’s 
a tortoise-shell tabby born, then you might 
better be dead than sitting there mooning 
about her. I give you up as a lost creature ! ” 



Mmch Hares, 


123 


“ Then all the more reason you should 
help me to cook a fine breakfast, to confront 
my doom upon,” replied Mosscrop, lightly. 
“ I didn’t quite promise that I’d call her in 
time to assist. It will be more of a surprise 
to have it all ready, spread in her honour, 
when she comes in. What do you think of 
soft roes grilled on toast, eh? You can get 
them in tins. And some little lamb cutlets— 
or perhaps venison—and then some eggs 
Bercy —you do those fit for a queen, and we 
might have-” 

“ The truth is,” put in the other, refiect- 
ively, “ that black is the only wholly satisfy¬ 
ing hair for a woman. The intervening com¬ 
promises—all the browns and chestnuts and 
reds and auburns—are a delusion. I see that 
very clearly now. Give me the hair that 
throws a purplish shadow, glossy and thick 
and growing well down upon the forehead, 
and then a straight-nosed face, wide between 
the eyes and rounded under the chin, and a 
complexion of a soft, pale olive. There’s 

nothing else worth talking about.” 

9 




124 


March Hares. 


“ I had thought of those small Italian 
sausages, but I don’t know that in hot weather 
they-” 

“ Oh rot! ” said the nobleman. “ Who 
wants to talk about muffins and ham fat at 
this time of night ? Have you no poetry in 
you, man? There was a divine creature on 
the steamer coming over—great eyes like a 
sloe, and the face of a Circassian princess, 
calm, regal, languid, yet with depths of pas¬ 
sion underneath that seemed to call out to you 
to risk your immortal soul for the sake of 

drowning in them-” 

“ My word, here is cheek, if you like! ” 
burst in Mosscrop, stormily. “ You won’t let 
me talk about my girl at all; you sneer and 
gibe and croak evil suspicions, and make a 
general nuisance of yourself at the least men¬ 
tion of her—and then you suppose I’m going 
to sit patiently and listen to such blithering 
twaddle as this. Damn it all, a man’s got 
some rights in his own room I ” 

“ I’m told not,” commented the Earl, 
grimly. 



Ma/i ch Hares, 


125 


“Now, why hark back to that?” demanded 
David, with a show of petulance. “ It’s all 
settled and done with, hours ago. But what 
I was saying was, it isn’t the decent thing for 
you to—to obtrude talk of that sort just to 
throw ridicule on a subject that I feel very 
keen about.” 

Drumpipes yauned frankly. “ It’s time 
you turned in, Davie,” he remarked. “ The 
lack of sleep aye makes you silly. I’ve no 
wish to ridicule your subject, as you call her. 
It’s not at all necessary. You’ll see for your¬ 
self how ridiculous it is in the morning. It 
merely occurred to me that if we must talk of 
women, I’d something in my mind worth the 
while—no strolling yellow-headed vagrant 
picked up at random on a bridge, but a gen¬ 
tlewoman in education and means and man¬ 
ners. Man, you should see her teeth when 
she smiles! ” 

“ Archie,” replied David, solemnly, “ I 
should think your own better instincts might 
prompt you to recall that you’ve only been a 
widower four months.” 



126 


Ma/rch Hares, 


“ Four months ?—Four hundred years ! ” 
cried the Earl, stoutly. He reached round and 
replenished his glass. “ It is with the great¬ 
est difficulty that I recall any detail of the 
matrimonial state. Already the memory of 
my first pair of breeks is infinitely fresher to 
me than any of it. In another week or so the 
last vestige of a recollection of it will be clean 
gone. And a good riddance, too ! ” 

“ It was an ill thought to remind you of 
it,” admitted Mosscrop. “ Devil take all 

women—or all but one-” 

“ And she black-haired,” interposed the 
Earl. 

“ Deuce seize them all but two, then, for 
the rest of the night. Where have you been 
the long year-and-a-half, Archie ? ” 

“Just looking about me,” replied the 
other, with nonchalance. “ Bechuanaland for 
a time, but it’s sore overrated. Then I had a 
shy at the Gaboon country, but there’s a con¬ 
spiracy among the niggers to protect the 
gorilla—I think he’s a sort of uncle of theirs 
—and a white man can do no good by himself. 



March Ha/res, 


127 


I thought there might be some decent sport 
over in Brazil, where they advertised a revolu¬ 
tion on, and I tried to travel around with the 
rebels for a while, but it wasn’t up to much. 
You brought down an occasional half-breed 
Portugueser with epaulettes on, but you 
couldn’t eat ’em, and you didn’t want ’em 
stuffed at any price; and besides, when you 
came to find out, the whole war was merely a 
fight between two firms of coffee-traders in 
New York, and that wasn’t good enough. I 
tell you what, though,” he went on, with more 
animation, “ Arizona is damned good fun. I 
haven’t seen anything better anywhere than a 
good, square cattle-lifter hunt. They got up 
three or four, just on my account, I imagine, 
after they found I could ride, and shoot at a 
gallop. The charm of the thing is that there’s 
no close season for cattle-thieves, and they’re 
game to the death, I tell you. I got potted 
twice, and once they let daylight straight 
through me. I had to lie up for repairs for 
nearly three weeks. They went and hung the 
fellow while I was in bed. We had words 



128 


March Ha/res, 


about that. I insisted it wasn’t sportsmanlike 
—and that they ought to have given him a 
horse, and then sprung him out of a trap or 
something of that sort, and let him have a run 
for his money, the same as we do with rabbits 
that the ferrets bring up. But they couldn’t 
see it, and so I turned it up and came North. 
They’ll ruin the whole thing, though, if they 
don’t chuck that foolish hanging business. 
The first thing they know, everybody’ll stop 
running off cattle, just as a protest, and then 
their place won’t be worth living in. It’ll be 
a pity, because a cow-boy gone wrong is really 
the best thing there is. He’s as good as a 
Bengal tiger and a Eussian wolf together, with 
a grizzly bear thrown in. You may quote me 
as saying so.” 

“ I shall not fail to do so,” said David. 
“ Come, drink up your liquor, and we’ll 
toddle. I’m fair glad to see you back whole 
and sound, laddie—and more still, a free 
man.” 

He brought forth from the bedroom a 
pillow and some blankets, and began arrang- 



Ma/rch Ha/res, 


129 


ing them upon the sofa. “And are the 
Americans so daft about lords and titles as 
they’re made out?” he asked as he worked. 
“ Did they humble themselves before the 
handle to your name ? ” 

Drumpipes sat up. “ Do you suppose I’m 
such an abandoned ass as to travel with a 
title ? ” he demanded. “ Man, if you knew 
what it cost me, even without it, it would turn 
your hair grey. Ten dollars here, twenty 
dollars there, seven dollars and a-half some¬ 
where else—one steady and endless drain on 
the purse, till the marvel is I was able to get 
out at all! And there’s no third-class on the 
railways whatever. It’s just terrible, Davie! 
And as ill-luck would have it, I couldn’t even 
come home steerage on the steamer. There 
were passengers that I knew in the first cabin, 
and so I had to throw away more money 
there. And I’m not like you—I’ve no 
ten-pound notes to spare for my day’s amuse¬ 
ment.” 

“No, you’re not like me,” responded Moss- 
crop, in no sympathetic tone. “ I have my 



130 


March Hares. 


magnificent £432 per annum, which is over 
eight guineas a week. And you—you have 
only a paltry four thousand odd, not more 
than ten times as much. I wonder you’ve 
kept off the rates so long, Archie.” 

“ Ah, I know all that,” protested the Earl. 
“But you have no damned position to keep 
up. You must remember that, Davie, It’s a 
very important fact. It makes all the differ¬ 
ence in the world.” 

“ But you only keep it up in your own 
mind, and that’s not an expensive place. 
There’s been no year since I first knew you, 
either as Master of Linkhaw or since you 
came into the whole of it, that you’ve spent 
the half of your income. To hear you talk, 
one would think you’d been scattering your 
capital as well with both hands.” 

“ Ah, but those lawyers’ bills, Davie! 
What think you now should they be like? 
Six hundred, eh ? Or may be seven ? ” 

“You’ll know soon enough. I’ll not en¬ 
courage you to pass a sleepless night. Come 
now. You’ve got things in your bag here. 



March Hares. 


131 


haven’t you? I can let you have whatever 
you lack.” 

“No, you keep your bed. I’ll sleep out 
here,” said Drumpipes. “ I’m a deal more 
used to roughing it than you are. I give you 
my word, I shall sleep here like a top.” 

Mosscrop strove to resist, but his friend 
was resolute, and the sofa had to be surren¬ 
dered to him. He rose, yawning, and began 
to throw off his outer garments. “ I’ve paid 
as high as eleven shillings for a bedroom for 
one night in New York city! ” he affirmed, 
drowsily, “ although, to give the Devil his due, 
they make no charge for candles and soap. 
Man, if they’d known I was an Earl, they’d 
have lifted all seven of my skins.” 

“ Oh, but they have a reputation for acu¬ 
men,” urged Mosscrop, drily. “ They’d have 
comprehended fine that you were but a Scotch 
Earl. Good night! ” 

The broad daylight woke David up nearly 
an hour later than it should have done. He 
had produced upon himself during the night 
an impression of sleeping very little—and that 



132 


March Ha/res, 


a light and dainty slumber, ready and eager 
on the instant of need to dissolve into utter 
wakefulness. Yet it was the fact, none the 
less, that he had ingloriously overslept him¬ 
self. The watch on his table pointed to half¬ 
past eight. 

He hurriedly drew on some of his gar¬ 
ments, and stepped into the sitting-room to 
rouse the Earl. To his great surprise that 
nobleman had disappeared. The tumbled 
bed-clothes showed where he had slept. There 
was his hand-bag, duly packed and closed, at 
the foot of the sofa. 

Keasoning that Drumpipes had not prom¬ 
ised to breakfast, and was a perverse creature 
anyway, and probably had been worried by 
early brooding over those lawyers’ bills into a 
restless mood, Mosscrop returned to his room, 
and completed the work of dressing. He 
shaved with exceptional care, and bestowed 
thought upon the selection of a neck-tie. It 
occurred to him that he had some better 
clothes than those he had worn yesterday, and, 
though he begrudged the time, the temptation 



Ma/rch Ha/res. 


133 


to make the change was irresistible. He did 
not regret yielding, when he surveyed his full- 
length image in the mirror on his wardrobe 
door. He seemed to himself to look years 
younger than he had done before that momen¬ 
tous birthday. He smiled and nodded knowing¬ 
ly at the happy and confident face in the glass. 

Under the circumstances, he should need 
help with the breakfast. The midnight notion 
of getting everything ready before he called 
his guest, submitted to abandonment without 
a murmur. He reverted joyfully to the origi¬ 
nal idea of letting her share all the delightful 
fun of preparing the meal. His fancy played 
with sportive tenderness about the picture of 
her, here in his tiny scullery which served as 
a kitchen, her sleeves rolled up, a towel pinned 
round her waist for an apron, actually cooking 
things for them both to eat. Very likely he 
knew more about that sort of thing than she 
did ; he beheld himself giving her instructions, 
as they bent together over the big gas cooking- 
stove. Could anything be more deliciously 
homelike than that ? 



134 


March Hares, 


That contrary, cross-grained Drumpipes 
had predicted that the whole thing would 
seem ridiculous to him in the morning. He 
affirmed to himself with fervour that it 
seemed more charming than ever as he went 
out into the passage, and knocked on the op¬ 
posite door. 

There seemed to be no answering sound, 
and he struck the panel more sharply, with 
his ear lowered to the keyhole. Still no re¬ 
sponse came. 

“ I am going to Covent Garden for a few 
minutes,” he called through the keyhole; 
“ shall I find you ready to help me when I 
get back ? ” 

Since this, too, brought no reply, he took 
out his duplicate key and cautiously opened 
the door. The question, repeated in a much 
louder tone, died away in profound silence. 
The glass eyes of a moose on the wall opposite 
stared at him with an uncomfortable fixity. 

The bedroom door was ajar, and David was 
emboldened to stride forward and beat smartly 
on it with his fist. Again he did this, and 



Ma/rch Hares, 


135 


then, while a strange excitement welled up¬ 
ward within him—or was it a sinking move¬ 
ment instead ?—flung the door open and 
looked in. 

There was no Vestalia here at all! 

The details that the bed was neatly made 
up, that the room showed no trace of recent 
occupancy, and that the dressing-hag was gone, 
soaked themselves vaguely through his mind. 
He looked about, both in this and the outer 
apartment, for a message of some kind, quite 
in vain. 

His pained attention wandered again in 
haphazard fashion to the head of the moose, 
fastened between two windows. The fatuous 
emptiness of its point-blank gaze suddenly in¬ 
furiated him, and he dealt its foolishly elon¬ 
gated snout a resounding whack with his open 
hand. The huge trophy toppled under the 
blow, swung half-loose on its fastening, then 
pitched with a crash to the floor. 

Mosscrop kicked it violently again and 
again where it lay. 




CHAPTEE VII. 

Mosscrop had not the heart to breakfast 
alone in his deserted lodgings. 

The impulse to get away mastered him on , 
the instant of its appearance. He strode forth 
as if delay were fraught with sore perils. At a 
shabby luncheon-bar in the Strand below he 
consumed a cup of abominable coffee and a dry 
sausage-roll in the same nervous haste. The 
barmaid in attendance was known to him. She 
annoyed him now by displaying in her manner 
the assumption that he wished to laugh and 
joke with her as usual. He glowered at her 
instead, and met her advances to conversation 
with a curt nod. 

“ You must have got out of the wrong side 
of the bed this morning,” she commented 
loftily. 


136 


March Ha/res. 


137 


“Very likely,” he answered with cold brev¬ 
ity, counting out the necessary coppers and 
turning on his heel. 

Outside he seemed to himself to choose the 
direction of his steps quite at random. He 
walked slowly, trying to fasten his brain down 
to the task of conjecturing what on earth it all 
meant. Alas, his mind was as empty as those 
desolate rooms up at the top of Dunstan’s Inn. 
The power of^ coherent speculation had left 
him. It was hardly possible even to arrange 
in decent sequence the details of what had 
happened. An indefinitely sweeping rage at 
destiny in general oppressed all his faculties. 
He muttered meaningless oaths under his 
breath as he went along, directed at an intan¬ 
gible “ it ” which was equally without form and 
personality, a mere abstract symbol of the uni¬ 
versal beastliness of things. 

The notion of cursing Vestalia did not sug¬ 
gest itself. So far as he had any intelligible 
thoughts about her, they were instinctively ex¬ 
culpatory. She seemed indeed to have behaved 
stupidly, but it must have been under a mis- 



138 


Ma/rch Hares, 


apprehension of some sort. Something per¬ 
verse had happened to lead her off into a fool¬ 
ish course of action. He resolutely declined 
to open his mind to any other view of her. 
She must have quitted the Inn for some reason 
which wholly satisfied her sense of honourable 
conduct. What was this reason? Had she 
conjured it up out of her own meditations, or 
had it been furnished to her from an external 
source ? 

All at once he stopped short, mental and 
bodily progress alike arrested by a striking 
thought. “ Damn him! ” he murmured to 
himself, as he turned this new idea over. Now 
that it had come to him, he fairly marvelled at 
the dulness which had failed to discover it at 
the beginning. It was as plain as the nose on 
one’s face—the Earl had bidden Vestalia to be¬ 
gone. “ Ah, that miserly, meddling fool of a 
Drumpipes! ” he groaned, between clenched 
teeth. 

This laying bare of the mystery brought no 
consolation. The day was as irretrievably 
ruined, the tender little romance as ruthlessly 



Ma/rcTi Hares, 


139 


crushed, as ever. A certain doubtful solace 
seemed to offer itself in the shape of a quarrel 
with Drumpipes, but Mosscrop shook his head 
despondently at it. What good would that 
do ? And for that matter, how should one go 
to work to quarrel with that tough-hided, fatu¬ 
ous, conceited, dense-witted, imperturbable, 
and impenetrable idiot ? He would never even 
perceive that the attempt was being made. 
David piled up in reverie the loathly epithets 
upon the over-large bald head of his friend 
with a savage satisfaction. “ You preposter¬ 
ous clown!” he snarled at the burly blond 
image of the absent nobleman in his mind’s 
eye. “ You gratuitous and wanton ass ! Oh, 
you unthinkable duffer! ” 

And somehow there was after all a kind of 
relief in these comminatory exercises. The 
dim light of a possible diversion began to filter 
through the storm-cloud of Mosscrop’s wrath. 
He was still bitterly depressed, and furious as 
well, of course, but self-possession was returning 
to him, and with it the capacity for planning and 
ordering his movements. It occurred to him 
10 



140 


March Hares, 


that he ought to do something to turn his 
thoughts temporarily at least from this world- 
weary sadness. 

Up on the opposite corner his eye caught 
the legend “ Savoy Street.” He stared at the 
small sign, perched above the dingy brick cor¬ 
nice of the first-floor, for a moment with an 
unreflecting gaze. Then he turned and walked 
briskly down the steep hillside thoroughfare, 
and into the courtyard of the great hotel 
which, like the street and the quarter, com¬ 
memorates in its name the first of a long and 
steadfast line of needy Continental princes 
whose maintenance the British tax-payer has 
found himself fated to provide. 

At the desk, he wrote out a card and 
sent it up as an accompaniment to the in¬ 
quiry whether Mr. Laban Skinner was in or 
not. 

Ho, it was reported presently; Mr. Skinner 
had gone out—but the young lady was in. 

David pondered this unexpected intelli¬ 
gence. “ Did she tell you that she was in ? ” 
he asked the boy, suspiciously. 



March Ha/res, 


141 


Yes ; she had done so. 

Mosscrop discovered that he had been quite 
unprepared for this. He knit his brows and 
ruminated upon it. His impression had been 
at the time that the girl disliked him, or at 
least disliked the proposition which her absurd 
father had made. It seemed to him, more¬ 
over, that he disliked her in turn. She had 
stared rudely at poor Yestalia—hut then it 
should be remembered in fairness that all 
women did that to one another. Her attitude 
towards him had been ostentatiously apathetic, 
almost to the point of insolence; and yet he 
recalled that in that moment when he had 
caught her unawares, she had been displaying 
a notable interest in what was going on. The 
notion that there had been a sort of challenge 
underlying the mask of studied indifference 
she had presented to him returned to his mind. 
And he still needed diversion, too, as much as 
ever. 

“ If you will show the way,” he said to the 
boy at this juncture. 

The lift bore them a long distance upward. 



142 


Ma/rch Hares, 


quite to the roof it seemed. David formed 
the impression that rents must be cheap at 
that altitude; but when he took the first 
glance round the sitting-room into which he 
found himself presently ushered, the idea van¬ 
ished. 

It was a large and imposingly-appointed 
room, exhaling, as it were, an effect of high- 
priced luxury. The broad windows at the 
front came down to the fioor, and opened upon 
a balcony. There were awnings hung outside 
to ward off the sunshine, and this threw the 
whole apartment into a mellow twilight, con¬ 
trasting sharply with the brightness of the 
corridor Mosscrop had just quitted. 

, He looked about him, hesitatingly, to make 
sure that there really was no one in the room. 
The glimpse of some white drapery fluttering 
against the edge of a chair out on the balcony 
caught his eye, and he moved across to the 
nearest open window. The noble prospect of 
the Thames viewed from this height impressed 
itself with great vividness upon his mind, even 
in advance of his perception that he had in- 



Ma/rch Hares. 


143 


deed found Miss Skinner. He looked down¬ 
ward witk a gaze which embraced both the 
girl and the river, and for a moment they pre¬ 
served an equally unconscious aspect. 

The young lady then lifted her head, side- 
wise, and acknowledged Mosscrop’s presence 
by a slow drooping movement of her black 
lashes. “How do you do?” she remarked, 
placidly. “ Bring out a chair for your¬ 
self.” 

He did as he was told, and seated himself 
near the balustrade, so that he partially faced 
her; but he looked again at the wonderful pic¬ 
ture below, to collect his thoughts. 

“ I had no idea it was so magnificent up 
here,” he said at last. 

“ Indeed,” commented his companion. It 
was impossible to say whether the remark was 
in the nature of an exclamation or an inquiry. 
Mosscrop found himself compelled to glance 
up, if only to determine this open ques¬ 
tion. 

The realisation that she was extremely well 
worth looking at swept over him like a fiood, 



144 


March Ha/res, 


at the instant of his lifting his eyes. It suited 
her to be bare-headed, and to wear just the 
creamy white cashmere house-gown that he 
beheld her in. The glossy plaits and masses 
of her hair were wonderful. In the softened, 
tinted half-shadow of the awning her dark 
skin glowed with a dusky radiance which fas¬ 
cinated him. Her mien was as imperious as 
ever, but it suggested now an empress disposed 
to play, a sultana whose inclination was for 
amusement. 

“ Did you come up to see the view ? I dare¬ 
say it is even better from the leads. You call 
them leads here, don’t you? Your novels 
always do, I know.” 

, This speech of hers, languidly delivered, 
had its impertinent side, without doubt, but 
Mosscrop caught in its tone a not unamiable 
intention. She did not smile in response to 
the puzzled questioning of his swift glance, 
but he convinced himself none the less that it 
was a pleasantry. He noted in this instant of 
confused speculation that she had a book in 
her lap—a large, red-covered volume with 



March Hares, 


145 


much gilt on the binding—and that she 
kept a finger in it to mark some particular 
place. 

“ Your father was good enough to ask me 
to call,” he reminded her, with gentleness. 

“ I asked for him, and I-” 

“ You are disappointed to find him out?” 

Yes; there could be no doubt she was 
amusing herself. “ Oh, that depends,” ven- ^ 
tured David, with temerity. 

The girl surveyed him at her leisure. “ If 
I remember aright,” she said, “ you were in¬ 
vited conditionally. You were to come, or 
rather to communicate with us, if you decided 
to close with my father’s offer. So I suppose 
you’ve made up your mind to accept.” 

“ Well, I should like to talk more about it; 
get a clearer idea of what was proposed.” 

“ My father takes great pains in expressing 
himself. I should have said his explanation 
was as full as anything could well be on this 
earth.” 

“ To speak frankly,” replied David, “ I got 
the idea that you didn’t care much about your 





146 


March Hares, 


father’s scheme—in fact, that you disliked it. 
That’s what I wanted to be clear about. It 
would be ridiculous for me to be going round, 
delivering instructive lectures to you on an¬ 
tiquities and ruins and so forth, and you hat¬ 
ing me all the while for a bore and a nui¬ 
sance. It would place us both in a false 
position.” 

“ And you can’t stand false positions, 
eh?” 

Mosscrop rose. “ I’m afraid I can’t stand 
this one, at all events,” he answered, with dig¬ 
nified brevity. 

“ Oh, you mustn’t think of going! ” his 
hostess protested, with a momentary ring of 
animation in her voice. “ My father’s liable 
to return any minute, and he’d be greatly put 
out to find he’d missed you.” 

“I could wait for him in the reception 
room downstairs,” he suggested, moodily— 
“ or, for that matter, I don’t know that it’s 
very important that we should meet at all.” 

“ I don’t call that a bit polite,” she com¬ 
mented. 



March Hares, 


147 


“I’m afraid your standards of politeness 
are beyond me,” be began, formally. Then 
the absurdity of the thing struck him, and he 
grinned in a reluctant fashion. “Do you 
really want me to stay ? ” he asked, with the 
spirit of banter in his tone. 

“ Oh that depends,” she mocked back at 
him. “ If you can be amusing, yes.” 

“Just how amusing must I be?” He 
dropped into his chair again, and this time 
laid his hat aside. 

“ Oh, say as much so as you were yesterday 
with the young lady of the butter-coloured 
hair. I think that would about fill the 
bill.” 

Mosscrop ground his teeth with swift an¬ 
noyance. Then he chuckled in a mood of 
saturnine mirth. Finally he sighed, and dole¬ 
fully shook his head. 

“ Ah, yesterday! ” he mourned, drawing a 
still deeper breath. 

“ You were extremely entertaining, then,” 
pursued the other, ignoring his emotions. 
“ Do you find yourself—as a usual thing, I 



148 


March Ha/res, 


mean—varying a good deal from day to day ? 
I ask entirely from curiosity. I’ve never met 
anyone before in precisely your position.” 

“No, I should think not!” be assented, 
with gloomy emphasis. “I can well believe 
that my position is unique in the history of 
mankind. Such grotesque luck could scarcely 
repeat itself. But I beg your pardon—it isn’t 
a thing that would interest you; I had no 
business to mention it at all.” 

“It was I who mentioned it, I believe,” 
she corrected him calmly. 

There was obvious meaning in her insist¬ 
ence. He looked up at her in vague surprise, 
the while he mentally retraced the steps by 
which the conversation had reached this 
point. There was undoubtedly a very know¬ 
ing expression in her eyes. Clearly she had 
meant to associate Yestalia with what she de¬ 
scribed as his position—the position which she 
deemed so unusual; it was equally plain that 
she desired him to understand that she did so. 
It was impossible that she should know any¬ 
thing of what had happened. He searched 



March Ha/res, 


149 


his memory, and made sure that no personal 
hint of any sort had drifted into that ram¬ 
bling discourse of his in the Assyrian corri¬ 
dors, which the Americans had more or less 
overheard. What then was she talking about? 

Ah, what indeed? She lay back in her 
chair, and met his gaze of bewildered interro¬ 
gation with a fine show of composure. She 
looked at him tranquilly through lazy, half- 
closed eyelids. His suspicions discerned be¬ 
neath the passive surface of this regard ani¬ 
mated under-currents of ironical amusement 
and triumph. There was nothing overt upon 
which he could found the challenge to an ex¬ 
planation, but as he continued to scrutinise 
her, he could fancy that her whole presence 
radiated the suggestion of repressed glee. 
Whatever the mystery might be, she was ex¬ 
tracting great delight from her possession of a 
clue to it. 

“ Yes, it was you who mentioned my posi¬ 
tion,” he remarked, groping lamely for some 
sure footing on which to redress his disadvan¬ 
tage. “ I don’t know that I quite follow you; 



150 


March Ha/res. 


wherein do you find my position, as you term 
it, so exceptional ? ” 

“ You yourself have boasted that it couldn’t 
be matched in all history,” she reminded him. 
Her tone was casual enough, but the sense 
of sport began to gleam unmistakably in her 
eyes. 

“Now you argue in a circle,” he remon¬ 
strated, with a shade of professional acerbity 
in his voice. “Your remark came before 
mine, and hence cannot possibly have been 
based upon my subsequent comment. If I 
may be permitted the observation, they seem 
to teach logic but indifferently in the United 
States.” 

“ Oh, that is why we came here,” retorted 
the girl, with ostentatious naivete. The con¬ 
ceit pleased her so much that she bent for¬ 
ward, and assumed the manner of one com¬ 
municating an important fact. “ That is why 
I had my father make you an offer at once. 
You know, most professors, and teachers, and 
so on, are so hard to understand. But the 
moment I laid eyes on you I said, ‘ There’s a 



March Ha/res, 


151 


man that I can see through as if he were 
plate-glass; I can read him like a book.’ And, 
of course, that must he the most valuable of 
all qualities in an instructor.” 

“So I am entirely transparent, am I? I 
present no secrets to your gaze ? ” Mosscrop 
spoke like one in whom pique and a sense of 
the comical struggled for mastery. “ Then I 
cannot do better than beg you to tell me some 
things about myself. Why, for example, do I 
sit here patiently and submit to be laughed at, 
heckled, satirised, and generally bully-ragged 
by a young lady, whose title to do these things 
is not in the least apparent to me ? ” 

“Why, don’t you remember? You’re 
waiting for papa.” 

“ And incidentally providing his offspring, 
in the interim^ with much harmless and chaste 
entertainment,” put in Mosscrop, drily. “ I 
am charmed to have diverted you so success¬ 
fully. It occurs to me, since you are so readi¬ 
ly amused, that you must have been wofully 
bored before I made my happy appearance.” 

“ Oh, quite the contrary,” . exclaimed the 


1 




152 


March Ha/res, 


girl, with a sudden stress in her tone, which 
hinted that this was what she had been wait¬ 
ing for. She opened the volume, as she spoke, 
at the place marked by her finger. “ I was 
reading in the Peerage, you know. It is a 
most entrancing book. I am never dull when 
I am reading about earls and things.” 

“ I have heard that the work enjoys a re¬ 
markable popularity in your country,” David 
remarked, sourly. 

“ There is such romance in it! ” she went 
on, in mock rhapsody; “ it makes such ap¬ 
peals to the imagination ! It puts you at once 
in an atmosphere of chivalry, of knightly ad¬ 
ventures and exploits, of tournaments and 
chain-armour, and courts of love-” 

“ And of divorce, and bankruptcy, too,” he 
interposed. “ Don’t forget those.” 

The girl looked grave for a moment, and 
nodded her head as if in relenting apology. 
Then she recovered her high spirits by as 
swift a transition. 

“ And such splendid old names as you get, 
too! ” she continued, with her eyes on the 



March Ha/res, 


153 


open page. “Listen to this, for example. 
Could anything be finer ? ” 

DRUMPIPES, Earl of. (Sir Archibald-Coro- 
nach-Dugal-Strathspey-Malcolm-Linkhaw) Vis¬ 
count Dunfugle of Inverdummie, and Baron 
Pilliewillie of Slug-Angus, Morayshire, all in the 
peerage of Scotland, and a Baronet of Nova 
Scotia. Born August 24th, 1866. Succeeded 
his grandfather as 19th Earl January 10th, 
1888. Married May 2nd, 1890, Janet-Eustasia- 
Marjory, 3rd daughter of the Master of Craigie- 
whaup by his wife, the Hon. Tryphena Pincock 
(who deceased March 6th, 1879), elder daughter 
of the 4th Baron Dubb of Kilwhissel. 

Skirl Castle, near Lossiewink, Elgin. Cluh^ 
Wanderers. 

She read it all with marked deliberation 
and distinctness of utterance. When she fin¬ 
ished, silence reigned for some time on the 
balcony. 

“ Well, am I not right?” she asked at last, 
lifting her head, and flashing the full richness 
of her black eyes into Mosscrop’s face. “ Don’t 
you admit the inspiration of such names?” 

David answered in a hesitating, dubious 
manner. “ I am more curious about the source 
—and scope—of your inspiration,” he said. 



154 


March Ha/res, 


“ Unhappily, it cannot be pretended that you 
are transparent. You confront me with an 
opacity against which my feeble wits beat in 
vain. I can see that it is known to you that 
I know Drumpipes. But why this fact should 
assume in your mind such portentous and 
mysterious dimensions, and why you should 
treat it with the air of one who has unearthed 
a great conspiracy, a terrible secret, I can’t for 
the life of me comprehend.” 

“ Ah, you are more complicated than I had 
thought,” she replied. “I did not imagine 
you would keep up the defence so long.” 

“Me?—a defence? never,” cried David, 
incited in some vague way by this remark to 
an accession of assurance. “ I defend nothing. 
I surrender with eagerness. I roll myself at 
your feet. Miss Skinner. All I crave in return 
is that you will put a label on my submission. 
It may be weak, but I should dearly like to 
know what it is that I am abandoning.” 

“ What I should suggest that you give up 
is your attempt to deceive me—us—as to your 
identity.” 



March Ha/res, 


155 


“Ah! am I indeed someone else, then? 
Upon my word, I can’t congratulate the other 
fellow.” 

“ You wrote your name down for my father 
yesterday, and again on this card here this 
morning, as Mosscrop—David Mosscrop.” 

He assented by a nod, and allowed the be¬ 
ginnings of an abashed and contrite look to 
gather upon his face. 

“Well, it just happened that, the moment 
I first laid eyes on you, I knew who you really 
were. By the merest accident, your picture 
had been shown to me—by a gentleman who 
knows you intimately, and is indeed distantly 
related to you—on shipboard coming over. I 
recognised you instantly, there in the Museum, 
and I made papa speak to you. I was curious 
to see what you would say and do.” 

“I’m afraid you were disappointed. Did 
you think I would shout and dance, or what ? ” 
He struggled with some degree of success to 
speak impassively. 

“ I had never met any one before in your 
position in life, and I had the whim to experi- 
11 



156 


March Hares, 


ment on my own account.” She said this as 
if defending her action to herself more than to 
her auditor. 

“ And may I have my little whim gratified 
too ? ” he asked. “ I am extremely curious to 
know how you like your experiment as far as 
you have got with it.” 

She did not answer immediately, and he 
occupied the interval by an earnest mental 
scuffle after some clue to what she was driving 
at. He knew of no man who possessed his 
portrait—at least among those who went down 
to the sea in ships. He had had no photo¬ 
graph taken for years, to begin with. A dis¬ 
tant relation of his, she had said, and on a very 
recent voyage from America. Who the deuce 
could it be ? What acquaintance of his had 
been of late in America ? All at once the an¬ 
swer leaped upward in his mind. He laughed 
aloud, with an abruptness which took him not 
less than his companion by surprise. But then 
a puzzled scowl overshadowed the grin on his 
countenance. He saw a little way farther into 
the millstone, but that was all. 



March Ha/res, 


lor 


“ I hope you don’t regret your experiment,” 
he repeated. “It would have been simpler, 
perhaps, if your father had mentioned that 
you were friends of Mr. Linkhaw’s. That in 
itself would have been an ample introduc¬ 
tion.” 

“ Perhaps we should have done so, had you 
been alone.” Her tone was cool to the verge 
of haughtiness. 

He rapidly considered what this might 
mean. Her remark clearly indicated that Ves- 
talia’s presence had seemed to her reprehen¬ 
sible. Why ? There was some intricacy here 
which he could not fathom. That confounded 
Drumpipes had told her—what ? Eureka! He 
had it! The picture that she had seen was a 
little cheap ambrotype of Drumpipes and him¬ 
self, standing together, which had been made 
by a poor devil of a wayside photographer, two 
Derby days before. Undoubtedly that was 
what the Earl had shown her—the only one 
he could have shown her. And—why of 
course—Drumpipes had pointed him, David, 
out as the Earl. What his motive could have 



158 


March Hares, 


been, heaven only knew, but this was palpably 
the key to the riddle. 

He grasped this key with decision, on the 
instant. He straightened himself, frowned a 
little, and laboriously stiffened the tell-tale 
muscles about his mouth. 

“I don’t think I quite like this.notion of 
Linkhaw’s babbling about me and my affairs,” 
he said, with austerity. 

“ Oh, I assure you,” she protested, anxious¬ 
ly, “he was very cautious. He only gave the 
most sparing answers to my questions. I had 
to literally drag things from him.” 

“ But what business had he showing my 
picture about to begin with? He shall hear 
what I think of it! Men’s allowances have 
been stopped for less than that.” 

“ It will be very unjust indeed if you visit 
it upon him,” the girl urged, almost tremu¬ 
lously ; “ it was all my fault. I asked him 
one day if he had ever met a nobleman, and 
he, quite as a matter of course, mentioned that 
one of his own relatives was an Earl. One 
day, later, he was showing me a little tin-type 



Ma/rch Hares, 


159 


of himself, and he merely said that you were 
the other person in the picture, that was ail.” 

“ And then you proceeded to drag things 
from him. I believe that was your phrase,” 
remarked David, in a severe tone. The sensa¬ 
tion of having this proud and insolent beauty 
in a tremor of entreaty before him was very 
delightful. 

“ Naturally, I asked him questions,” she 
replied, with a little more spirit. “ Earls don’t 
grow on every bush with us. And for that 
matter, why, goodness me! he did nothing 
but praise you from morning till night. By 
his account, one would think butter wouldn’t 
melt in your mouth. He made you out a 
regular saint. I was quite prepared to see you 
with a halo round your head—and instead, 
I-” 

She stopped short, with a confused and 
deprecatory smile. David, noting it, rejoiced 
that he had taken a peremptory tone about the 
garrulous Linkhaw. 

“ Instead, you discovered that I was a mere 
flesh and blood mortal like the rest.” He per- 





160 


March Hares. 


mitted himself to unbend, and even to smile 
a little, as he furnished this conclusion to her 
sentence. “ Was it a very painful disillusion¬ 
ment ? ” 

“Oh, I’ve read and heard enough about 
the lives that your class lead here in Europe,” 
she replied, with a marked reversion toward 
her former manner. “ I don’t pretend that I 
was really surprised.” 

David assumed a judicial expression. 
“ Considering the way we are brought up, and 
the temptations that are thrust upon us,” he 
said, impartially, “ I would not say that we 
are so much worse than other men.” 

“ But you are pretty bad—that you must 
admit.” 

Before David had satisfactorily framed the 
admission expected of him, the sound of an 
opening door and of footsteps came from within. 

“ It is papa,” whispered the girl, leaning 
forward in a confidential manner. “ I’m going 
to tell him,” 

“ I see no valid objection,” answered David, 
with dignity. 




CHAPTER VIII. 

As the balcony was too small for another 
chair, and Mr. Skinner did not come to the 
window, his daughter led her guest into the 
sitting-room. 

“ Papa,” she said, “ you will recall the gen¬ 
tleman whom we met yesterday at the British 
Museum.” 

Mr. Skinner lifted to its place the pince- 
nez which depended on a gold thread from the 
lapel of his carefully-buttoned frock-coat, and 
scrutinised the person indicated in a painstak¬ 
ing manner. 

“ Ah, yes, indeed,” he said, continuing his 
gaze, but with no salutation, and no offer of 
the hand. 

“ IPs so dark in here, I don’t believe you 

do,” she remarked, to cover the awkwardness 
161 


162 


March Hares, 


of the moment. “ The sun has gone now, any 
way,” and she moved back and put a hand 
upon the awning-cord. 

“ Permit me,” said David, hurrying to her 
side, and pulling at the shade. 

“ He’s out of sorts about something,” the 
girl murmured furtively. “ Don’t mind it; 
just leave him to me.” 

In the brightened light, Mr. Skinner’s de¬ 
meanour seemed no more cordial. He re¬ 
garded his visitor with a doubtful glance, and 
gave indications of a sense of embarrassment 
in his presence. The daughter, however, was 
in no respect dismayed by her responsibility. 

“ Papa,” she said with brisk decision, “ it 
was all a joke yesterday. Our friend was so 
amused by your offer yesterday-” 

“ I beg your pardon, Adele,” the father 
interposed ceremoniously, “ but it becomes 
immediately incumbent upon me to express 
my dissent. To obviate any possible miscon¬ 
ception, it should be explicitly stated that, al¬ 
though it is true that the task of formulating 
the proposal to which you allude did un- 



Ma/rch Hares. 


163 


doubtedly devolve upon me, the proposition 
itself, both in spirit and suggestion, originated 
in your own consciousness.” 

“ All right,” she hurriedly went on, “ have 
it anyway you like. The point is that this 
gentleman thought it was funny, and so he 
capped it with his own little joke by pretend¬ 
ing to be some one else. He made up that 
name he gave you on the spur of the moment, 
just for sport. He came here this morning, 
just to explain. He was nervous about the 
deception, innocent though it was. Papa, let 
me introduce to you Mr. Linkhaw’s relation, 
of whom he spoke so often, you know—the 
Earl of Drumpipes.” 

Mr. Skinner took in this intelligence with 
respectful deliberation. He bowed mean¬ 
while, and, after a moment’s deferential hesi¬ 
tation, shook hands in a formal way with Da¬ 
vid, and motioned him to a seat. 

“ Sir,” he began, picking his phrases with 
even greater care, “ you will excuse me if I do 
not address you as ‘ My Lord,’ since it is a 
form of words which I cannot bring myself to 



164 


March Hares. 


regard as seemly when employed by one hu¬ 
man being toward another; but I gather from 
my daughter’s explanation that your state¬ 
ments yesterday concerning your identity were 
conceived in a spirit of pleasantry. Under 
ordinary circumstances, sir, the revelation that 
an entirely serious and decorous suggestion of 
mine had been received with hilarity might 
not convey to my mind an exclusively flatter¬ 
ing impression. But I do not, sir, close my 
eyes to the fact that a wide gulf of usage and 
custom, and, I might say, of principles, sepa¬ 
rates a simple Jeffersonian Democrat like my¬ 
self from the professor of an hereditary Euro¬ 
pean dignity. I am therefore able, sir, to ac¬ 
cept, with comparatively few reservations, the 
explanation which you have tendered to my 
daughter, and vicariously, as I understand it, 
to me.” 

David repressed a groan, and hastily cast 
about in his mind for a decent pretext for 
flight. “ I assure you that it greatly relieves 
me to And you so courteously magnanimous,” 
he said. “ I merely yielded to the playful im- 



March Ha/res, 


165 


pulse of the moment; and as your daughter 
has so kindly told you, I made haste thereafter 
to repair my error, when its possible misinter¬ 
pretation occurred to me.” He bowed again, 
in response to the other’s solemn genuflection, 
and looked toward the door. 

“I should be pleased, sir,” Mr. Skinner 
said, “if you would honour us by remaining 
to luncheon.” 

“ Ah, I should have liked that so much,” 
answered David, with fervour, “ but unhappily 
I have an engagement at Marlborough House. 
It will be no end of a bore, but it can’t be 
helped. An invitation there, you know, is 
equivalent to a command. That is one of the 
drawbacks of a monarchy—but of course every 
system has its weak points.” 

“ That is a generalisation,” returned Mr. 
Skinner, “ to which I am not prepared to give 
unmeasured adhesion. I will explain to you, 
sir, briefly, the reasons which dictate my hesi¬ 
tation to entirely-” 

“ I’m afraid, Mr. Skinner, that I must tear 
myself away,” put in David, anxiously con- 




166 


March Ha/res. 


suiting his watch. “The Prince never for¬ 
gives a fellow being late. He has to live so 
much on a time-table himself, you know, for¬ 
ever catching trains, and changing his uni¬ 
forms, and turning up at the exact minute all 
over the place, laying corner-stones, and open¬ 
ing docks and unveiling statues, and so on, 
that it makes him intolerant of other people’s 
lapses. And he’s got a fearful memory for 
that sort of thing.” 

“I assume that you speak of the Heir 
Apparent,” commented the other. “ Am I to 
understand that you live in a state of personal 
subjection—that a nobleman in your position, 
for example, contemplates with apprehension 
the contingency of causing even the most triv¬ 
ial and transitory displeasure to the person¬ 
age alluded to ? ” 

“Apprehension, my dear sir? Positive 
horror! Ah, you little know the reality! 
Thoughtless people see us from the outside, 
and they lightly imagine that our lives are one 
ceaseless round of luxurious gaiety and gilded 
pleasure. They fancy that to have titles, to 



March Hares. 


167 


bear hereditary distinctions, to fill high places 
at Court, must be the sum of human happiness. 
Of course, I suppose we do have a better time 
than the average, but we pay a price for it. 
We smile, it is true, but there is always a 
shudder beneath the smile. A mere breath, a 
suspicion, the veriest paltry whim of royal dis¬ 
favour, and we might better never have been 
born! And so,” he finished with an uneasy 
graciousness, “ you will understand my abrupt 
leavetaking now.” 

“ I promise myself on another occasion, 
sir,” said Mr. Skinner, with more warmth, 
“ the privilege of discussing these topics with 
you at length. I do not deny that I am my¬ 
self, to-day, somewhat preoccupied, and lack¬ 
ing in the power of intellectual concentration. 
Another occasion, I trust, will find me better 
fitted to bestow upon these subjects the alert¬ 
ness of comprehension and clarity of judg¬ 
ment which their importance demands. At 
the moment, I confess my mind is burdened 
with another matter.” 

“ 0, papa—you haven’t gone and lost your 



168 


March Hares, 


letter of credit! ” The girl intervened with 
accents of alarm. 

The old gentleman shook his head, and 
smiled in a dubious fashion. “No,” he re¬ 
plied, hesitatingly, “it is merely that I—I 
have been enjoined to secrecy about a very 
curious and interesting revelation which has 
been made to me, and concealment is pro¬ 
foundly alien to my nature. The necessity for 
maintaining a mysterious reserve weighs upon 
me, sir, with unaccustomed oppression.” 

“ It is something that you have learned 
this morning ? ” demanded the daughter. “ I’ll 
make you tell me as soon as we’re alone.” 

“ Ah, that cannot be,” the father answered. 
“ My faith has been honourably pledged, and 
must be scrupulously observed.” 

“But surely it couldn’t have been stipu¬ 
lated that I was not to know,” she urged. 
“That would be absurd. And besides, who 
knows of even my existence over here ? ” 

“Incomprehensible as it may appear to 
your perceptions,” responded Mr. Skinner, “ it 
happens that you were particularly alluded to 



March Hares, 


169 


in the terms of the confidential compact im¬ 
posed upon me.” 

“ Then you had no business to enter into 
it at all,” she replied, vigorously. “ Papa, I 
am surprised at you! ” 

There was something in his thoughts 
which lit the old gentleman’s dry countenance 
with a transient gleam of enjoyment. “I 
hazard the humble opinion that your surprise 
will be appreciably augmented when, at the 
proper time, the truth shall have been re¬ 
vealed to you.” He turned, with the flicker- 
ings of a whimsical smile in his eye, to their 
guest. “It is an extraordinary coincidence, 
sir; but you are also in a manner associated 
with the occult event to which I may not at 
present more pointedly refer.” 

David musingly looked the old gentleman 
in the eye. “Yes, I know,” he answered; 
“ but I agree with you that it should not be 
divulged to your daughter. As you have said, 
we men of the world are in duty bound to 
keep a decent veil drawn over certain phases 
of life. I am quite with you in that, sir; we 



170 


March Ha/res. 


cannot sufficiently respect and guard the 
sweet-minded innocence of our young 
ladies.” 

Mr. Skinner looked hard at the nobleman, 
and drew up his slender figure. “ My mem¬ 
ory, sir,” he announced stiffiy, “ fails to recall 
any observation resembling in the slightest 
degree, either in form or sentiments, that 
which you have ascribed to me. Forgive me, 
sir, if I venture to further remind you that I 
have no desire to regard myself, or to be re¬ 
garded, as a man of the world, in the sense in 
which I understand that term to be used by 
the aristocratic class in Great Britain.” 

The young lady seemed to share her 
father’s feelings in the matter. “You must 
remember. Lord Drumpipes,” she put in, 
coldly, “ that our standards in such things are 
not yours. I daresay it seems natural enough 
to one in your position, and with your ante¬ 
cedents and associations, that a venerable, 
white-haired old gentleman should have dis¬ 
graceful secrets which he ought to conceal 
from his family; but we take a different view 



Ma/rch Ha/res, 


111 


of the meaning of the word ‘ gentleman,’ and 
of the obligations which it involves.” 

“ Ah, now I have offended you! ” cried 
David, with a show of remorse. “I assure 
you that my only thought was to help your 
good father out of a fix. If I have done 
wrong, I beg you will put it down to my over¬ 
eagerness to be of assistance. And now,” he 
stole a dismayed glance at his watch, “now I 
really must run. Good-bye! Good-bye', Mr. 
Skinner. Eemember that I count upon that 
famous discussion with you. And you may 
rely entirely upon my discretion—in the mat¬ 
ter of your secret, you know.” 

Father and daughter stood for a moment, 
gazing at the door behind which their noble 
guest had disappeared. Then the girl turned 
her eyes with decision upon the author of her 
being. 

“Papa,” she said, with calm resolution, 
“ what did he intend to convey by his remarks 
about this secret of yours ? ” 

“ Why, Adele,” the other protested, falter¬ 
ing a little under her look, “ you yourself re- 
13 



172 


March Hares, 


pudiated, in the most eloquent and unanswer¬ 
able words, the bare suggestion that I could 
possibly be animated by the desire to cloak 
any unworthy deed or incident from your 
observation.” 

“That was for his benefit,” she replied, 
tranquilly. “ I was determined that he should 
know what we thought of his code of morals. 
But that does not at all affect the question of 
what you have been doing. Do I understand 
that you are going to insist on refusing to tell 
me where you have been, whom you have seen, 
what your so-called secret is about ? ” 

“ Adele! ” he urged, “ I really must pre¬ 
serve a reticence as to the essential details of 
the matter in question—perhaps only for a 
few days—at least until the obligation of se¬ 
crecy is removed. You would not have me 
recreant to my plighted faith, would you ? ” 
“But what business had you going and 
making her any such promise ? ” 

“ Her! ” Mr. Skinner said, feebly smiling; 
“you jest, my dear Adele. How can you 
conceivably imagine it was a ‘her ’?” 




Ma/rch Ha/res. 


173 


“ I don’t imagine; I know,” responded the 
daughter, with a hard, dry smile. “ You have 
been seeing that yellow-haired girl that Lord 
Drumpipes had with him at the Museum yes¬ 
terday. The letter which summoned you 
forth this morning was from her. You made 
some paltering excuses to me, and went out to 
meet her—and you won’t look me in the eye 
and deny it.” 

In truth he did not take up her challenge. 
He hung his head, looked away, and shuffled 
with his feet. “ All I am at liberty to say,” 
he remarked at last, with visible emotion, “ is 
that my grief at being compelled to rest tem¬ 
porarily under the unwelcome shadow of your 
suspicion is, to some slight extent, mitigated 
by the consciousness that when you know all 
you will do ample justice to the probity of my 
motives and the honourable character of my 
actions. I might even go further, and express 
the conviction that the outcome will be of a 
nature to afford you unalloyed personal satis¬ 
faction.” 

“ That may all be,” returned Adele; “ but, 





174 


March Hares, 


in the meantime, you don’t go out in London 
any more by yourself! ” 

Mosscrop laughed to himself as he ran 
down the stairs of the hotel. The spirit of 
mirth remained with him while he more 
slowly ascended the flight of steps, and the 
dingy passage and covered by-way leading up 
to the Strand. It was the most comical thing 
he had ever heard of, and he chuckled again 
and again during the climb. But upon the 
bustling crowded thoroughfare' it somehow 
ceased to seem so funny, or at least its value 
as a source of entertainment began to dimin¬ 
ish rapidly. He found his mind reverting ir¬ 
resistibly to the disappointment of the early 
morning. The image of Vestalia rose upon 
his mental vision, and would not go away. 
He brooded over it as he walked, and recog¬ 
nised that intervening incidents and personali¬ 
ties had in no sense dimmed his interest in it. 
He pictured her wonderful hair again, her 
bright-faced smile, her dear little airs and 
graces, with a yearning emptiness of heart. 



Ma/rch Hares, 


175 


The luncheon obtainable at the Barbary 
Club was eyen more .unpalatable than usual, 
which was saying much. The familiar fact 
that the waiters were Germans struck him 
afresh, and took on the proportions of an in¬ 
ternational grievance. There were some fel¬ 
lows upstairs playing at what they supposed 
was whist. He stood for a while over the 
shoulders of a couple of the gamesters, and 
noted, with a cynical eye, the progress of their 
hot rivalry as to which should contribute the 
larger incapacity and the finer stupidity to 
the losing of the rubber. When they asked 
him if he wanted to cut in, he turned away 
with a snort of derisive scorn. 

Over in the billiard-room there were only 
the marker and the member who played far 
worse than anybody else in the club. David 
sourly consented to occupy himself with this 
egregious outsider, and was beaten by him. 
The result was so clearly due to accident that 
he laid some money on the next game. Again 
the duffer fiuked like mad, and won, and in a 
third game his luck was of such a glaring 



176 


Ma/rch Hm^es, 


character, that Mosscrop could not refrain 
from loud comment. This his antagonist re¬ 
sented. They parted with harsh words, and 
Mosscrop, cursing the hour when it first oc¬ 
curred to him to identify himself with such a 
squalid pot-house, hastened angrily to shake 
its dust from his feet. 

He made his way, by devious streets whose 
old hook-stalls for once beckoned him in vain, 
to Bloomsbury and the Museum. A kind of 
idea had grown up unobtrusively in the back¬ 
ground of his thoughts, that possibly he might 
find Yestalia there. It assumed the definite 
outlines of an expectation as soon as he en¬ 
tered the building. When he stood in the 
reading-room itself, and began a systematic 
scrutiny of its radiating rows of readers, it 
was with as much confidence as if he had 
come by appointment. The failure to dis¬ 
cover her disturbed and annoyed him. He 
made a slow tour of the inner circle, then an¬ 
other of the broader outer ring, and suffered 
no one of the professed students to escape his 
examining eye. 



March Hares. 


± 


What a crew they were! He had never 
realised it before. His hostile inspection laid 
bare the puerile devices of the young fools 
who came by concerted arrangement, took 
down books at random, and, sitting close to¬ 
gether, carried on clandestine flirtations under 
the sightless mask of literature. He glowered 
with a newly-informed vision at the extraor¬ 
dinary females whom no one had planned to 
meet—the lone women with eccentric coiffures 
and startling costumes, who emerge from 
heaven knows where, and mysteriously gather 
here in quest of something which it seems in¬ 
credible that even heaven should be able to 
define. Observing now the vacuous egotism 
of their flutterings and posturings in other 
people’s way, the despairing clutch at public 
attention made by their outlandish vestiture 
and general get-up, David’s thoughts settled 
grimly upon the fact that there were lands, 
the seats of ancient civilizations, where super¬ 
fluous female children were drowned at birth. 
Here, he reflected, with sullen irony, we teach 
them to read and write, and build and stock 



6 


March Ha/res, 


a vast reading-room for them instead. His 
mood preferred the Ganges to the Thames. 

There was more pathos in the spectacle of 
another class of habitual attendants—the poor, 
shabby, hungry serfs of the quotation mer¬ 
chant. Mosscrop knew the genus by sight, 
and in other times had had amusement from 
their contemplation. Now a sombre rage pos¬ 
sessed him as he beheld them toiling unin- 
telligently, hopelessly, under the lash of starva¬ 
tion. He watched one of the slave-drivers for 
a while, a short, red man, of swollen spiderish 
aspect, who moved about keeping these sweated 
wretches at their toil, now doling out a few 
pence to one who could remain erect unnour¬ 
ished not a minute longer, and who slunk out 
forthwith with a wolfish haste, now withering 
some other with whispered reproaches of 
threats. Mosscrop longed to go and break this 
creature’s neck, or at the very least to kick him, 
with loud curses and utmost contumely, from 
the room. 

He went out himself, instead, animated by 
a freshening spirit of resentment at the futility 



March Hares, 


179 


of existence. From sheer force of habit, he 
dawdled in front of shop-windows, turned over 
books and prints in one after another of his 
accustomed resorts for second-hand merchan¬ 
dise, and otherwise killed time till the dinner 
hour. But he did it all without any inner 
pretence that the process afforded him consola¬ 
tion. Even when he met some fellows from 
the Temple, in Chancery Lane, and joined 
them in a series of visits to ancient bars in the 
vicinity, where they all stood at wearisome 
length, and argued with intolerable inconse¬ 
quence about wholly irrevelant matters over 
their drinks, his thoughts maintained a moody 
concentration upon the theme of his personal 
unhappiness. The stray contributions which he 
offered to the general conversation were all of 
an acrid, not to say truculent, character. He 
had a sort of dour satisfaction in the utterance 
of offensive gibes and bitter jokes. Twice the 
threat of an altercation arose, in consequence 
of these ill-natured comments of his, and David 
sullenly welcomed the imminent quarrel; but 
the intervention of the others, without any help 



180 


March Hares. 


from him, cleared the atmosphere again. Even 
the peacemakers, however, evinced the opinion 
that he was behaving badly, and nodded cheer¬ 
ful adieus when at last he declared that they 
were a parcel of uninspired loons, with whom 
he marvelled to find himself consuming valu¬ 
able time. They lifted their glasses at him 
mockingly as he strode away, with the gleam 
of an unexpressed “ good riddance ! ” in their 
eyes. 

The consciousness that he had made him¬ 
self disagreeable to these fellows had its uses as 
a counter-irritant to his inner self-disgust. It 
rendered solitude at least a trifle more support¬ 
able. He bought a novel, and read it beside 
his plate at Simpson’s, where the heavy joints 
and weighty old ale just fitted his mood. The 
book was one which the papers were talking of 
for the moment. David reflected grimly as he 
skimmed the opening chapters that Vestalia 
had asked him why he didn’t write a Scotch 
novel. They were all the vogue, she said, and 
while the fashion lasted, it was nonsense for 
any Scotchman to pretend that he could not 



March Hares, 


181 


profitably occupy his leisure time. He had re¬ 
plied, with some flippancy, that his imagina¬ 
tive powers might compass the construction of 
a tale, but were unequal to the task of invent¬ 
ing also a whole dialect to tell it in. hTow, as 
the whim returned to him, his fancy parodied 
a title for this unborn work. How would “ A 
Goddess, Some Merely Ordinary Fools and 
Lord Drumpipes ” do ? 

Ah! that Drumpipes! David paid his bill, 
lit a cigar, and sallied forth, suddenly informed 
with the notion of going to the Inn, and hav¬ 
ing it out with the Earl. He doubled up his 
fists as he hurried along. 

The top floor at Dunstan’s was wrapped in 
darkness. Mosscrop knocked and kicked first 
at “ Mr. Linkhaw’s ” door to make sure that no 
one was in, then opened his own, and struck a 
light. The apartment wore still in his eyes 
the chill desolation of aspect which he remem¬ 
bered from the morning. There had been a 
change in the weather, and the suggestion of a 
fire was in the damp air. He put on his loose 
jacket and slippers, recalling sadly as he did 



182 


March Ha/res, 


so the vision he had beheld only twenty-four 
hours before, of that pretty little ermined foot¬ 
gear on the fender beside his, in front of the 
glowing grate. He brought out the decanter 
and a glass, and sighed deeply. 

Then all at once he caught sight of some¬ 
thing white in the letter box. In the same 
instant he was tearing open a stamped en¬ 
velope, addressed in a large, strange hand 
which yet he knew so well, and excitedly 
striving to gulp in the meaning of the whole 
written page before him, without troubling to 
read the lines in their sequence. Yes, it was 
from her, and—yes, it contained words of 
kindness and even of tenderness which shone 
brilliantly forth here and there from the con¬ 
text. He pulled himself together, and walk¬ 
ing over to the light, began resolutely at the 
beginning. 

“ Deae Me. Mossceop,— I hope you were 
not very much disappointed at finding me 
gone this morning, or rather, I hope you were 
a little disappointed, but will not be so any 



March Hares, 


183 


longer when you get this explanation. I don’t 
know either that it can be called an explana¬ 
tion, for it doesn’t seem to me that I am at all 
able to explain even to myself, much less to 
you. 

“ The fact is that you were so kind and so 
sweet to me, that I simply had to do what I 
have done. I saw it all, after we had parted. 
Under the circumstances, and especially con¬ 
sidering the delicate and noble manner in 
which you had treated me, it was the only 
thing I could do! 

“ I should have left a message for you in 
your letter-box, but there was not a scrap of 
paper, not even a book out of which I could 
tear a fly-leaf, in Mr. Linkhaw’s room, nor 
writing materials of any sort. I have bought 
this paper at the stationer’s, and am writing 
this note in an hotel writing-room. 

“The dear dressing-bag, and the other 
beautiful things which I owe to you, I took 
away with me because it would have broken 
my heart to leave them, and I felt sure you 
would be glad to have me take them. Every 



184 


March Hares, 


time I look at them, and all other times too, I 
shall think of the best man I ever knew or 
dreamed of. Something very important has 
occurred, which may turn out to he of the 
greatest possible advantage to me. It is very 
uncertain as yet, and I cannot tell you about 
it at present, but soon I hope to he able to 
do so. 

“ In the meantime, please believe in my 
undying gratitude. VifeTALiA.” 

David drew a long breath, poured a drink for 
himself, lit his pipe, and sat down to read the 
letter all over again. He arrived slowly at the 
conclusion that he was glad she had written it 
—but beyond that his sensations remained ob¬ 
stinately undefined. The girl had disappeared 
behind a thick high wall which his imagina¬ 
tion was unequal to the task of surmounting. 
A few stray facts assumed a certain distinct¬ 
ness in his mind: she had evidently gone off 
quite of her own accord, and she had appreci¬ 
ated the spirit of his attitude towards her the 
previous day, and she had encountered on this, 



March ITares, 


185 


the following day, something or somebody 
which might bring her good luck. What kind 
of good luck ? he wondered. 

There was an implied promise in her words 
that he should be informed when this mys¬ 
terious beneficence assumed shape. This had 
very little comfort in it for him. In fact, 
he found he rather hated the idea of her 
enjoying good luck in which he had no 
share. 

Suppose instead that it didn’t come off. 
Would she return to him then, or at least let 
him know, so that he might hasten forward 
again as her special providence ? 

Ah, that is what he had wanted to be—her 
providence. The notion of doing everything 
for her, of being the source of all she had, of 
foreseeing her wants, inventing her pleasures, 
ministering joyfully to the least of her sweet 
little caprices—the charm of this role fascinated 
him more than ever. He recalled in detail 
the emotions of delight he had experienced in 
buying things for her. By some law which 
he recognised without analysing, the greatest 



186 


March Hares, 


pleasure had arisen from the purchase of the 
articles which she needed most. There had 
been only a moderate and tempered ecstasy in 
paying for champagne, but oh, the bliss of 
buying her boots, and those curling-irons, and 
the comb! He thrilled again with it, in 
retrospect. What would it have been to 
see her clad entirely in garments of his pro¬ 
viding ? 

But the cage was empty—the bird had 
flown. Would she come back again? Was 
there really the remotest hint of such a possi¬ 
bility in her letter ? 

Ho. He read it still again, and shook his 
head at the fender with a despairing groan. 
The gloom of his reverie benumbed his senses. 
He let his pipe go out, and suffered the glass 
at his elbow to remain untouched, as he sat 
with his sad thoughts for company, and did 
not even hear the footsteps which presently 
ascended the stairs. 

A soft little knock at the door startled 
him from his meditations. He stood up, 
with his heart fluttering, and lifted his hand 



March Hares. 


18V 


in wonderment to his brow. Had he been 
asleep and dreaming ? 

The dainty tapping on the panel renewed 
itself. David moved as in a trance toward the 
door. 


13 



CHAPTER IX. 

Mosscrop turned the spring-lock noise¬ 
lessly, and drew the door open with caressing 
gentleness. His eyes had intuitively prepared 
themselves to discern the slender form of 
Vestalia in the dim light of the passage. 
They beheld instead, with bewildered repul¬ 
sion, a burly masculine bulk. Wandering 
upward in angry confusion from the level on 
which they had expected her dear face, they 
took in the fatuous, moon-like visage of Lord 
Drumpipes. 

“ Dear God! ” groaned David, in frank 
abandonment to disgust. 

“I came up quietly this time,” said the 
Earl. “You made such a row about my 
being noisy last night, I thought to myself, 
‘ Now, anything to please Davie! I’ll steal up 

like a mouse in list-slippers.’ ” 

188 


March Ha/res. 


189 


David scowled angry impatience at him. 
“Who the deuce cares what you do?” he 
demanded, roughly. “ You might have 
marched up with a Salvation Army band, for 
all it matters to me.” 

“Ah,” said Drumpipes, placidly pushing 
his way past Mosscrop through the open door. 
“ Well, give me a drink, Davie, man, and then 
tell me all about it. Where may the lady be 
at the present moment ? ” 

Mosscrop came in, and produced another 
glass with a gloomy air. He watched the 
Earl seat himself in the biggest chair and 
help himself from the decanter, and light his 
pipe, all in moody silence. “She’s gone 
away,” he said at last, coldly. 

“ And a good job, too 1 ” remarked the 
other. “ Distrust all yellow-hair, Davie! 
Have you been in my place and seen what 
that woman did? There was my Athabaska 
moose actually torn from the wall, and pulled 
to bits on the floor! It’s a matter of fifty 
shillings, or even more, Davie. Considering 
what you’d already spent on her, I call that 



190 


Ma/rch Hares, 


heartless behaviour on her part. She must be 
a bad sort indeed to take all you would give 
her, and fool you to the top of your bent, and 
then wantonly destroy property that she knew 
you’d have to make good, before she took 
French leave. Ah, women are not given that 
kind of hair for nothing! You’re well out of 
a thankless mess, Davie.” 

Mosscrop looked musingly at his friend. 
He smiled a little to himself, and then sighed 
as well. A calmer temper returned to him. 
“ I don’t take your view of it, Archie,” he said, 
almost gently. “ I have been as sad about it 
as a child who’s lost its pet, but I’m less dis¬ 
consolate than I was. Some compensations 
occur to me—and besides, I have a letter from 
her. It came to-night, and from its tone-” 

“Burn it, man, burn it!” the other ad¬ 
jured him, with eager fervour. “Drive the 
whole business from your mind! If you’ll 
give me your solemn word, Davie, not to see 
her again”—the Earl paused, to invest his 
further words with a deeper gravity—“ if you’ll 
promise faithfully to have no more to do with 



Ma/rch Hares, 


191 


her, I’ll forgive you the moose. I said fifty 
shillings, but I doubt your getting a good job 
much under three pounds. Well, then, if you 
say the word. I’ll pocket that loss. Hang it 
all, you’re my boyhood friend, and I’d go to a 
considerable length to save you from a dan¬ 
gerous entanglement of this sort. Although 
it was by no means an ordinary head. Man, I 
fair loved that moosie! ” 

Mosscrop’s smooth-shaven and somewhat 
sallow visage had gradually lost its melancholy 
aspect. A cheerful grin began now to play 
about the corners of his mouth. “ Archie,” he 
said with an affectation of exaggerated seri¬ 
ousness, “ a inoose more or less is not worth 
mentioning by comparison with the situation 
which is about to confront you. I know the 
particular beast you speak of. It was not up 
to much. The fur was dropping out in patches 
on its neck, one of its eyes was loose, and the 
red paint on the nostrils was oxidized. You 
would not have got twelve-and-six for it any¬ 
where in the world. But if it had been the 
choicest trophy that was ever mounted, and 



192 


March Ha/res, 


then its value were multiplied a hundred-fold, 
it would still be a waste of your time to give 
it a second thought. Graver matters demand 
your attention, Archie.” 

The Earl’s countenance lengthened, and he 
set down his glass. He apparently did not 
trust himself to speak, hut stared in alarmed 
inquiry at his friend. 

“ As you said a while ago,” pursued David, 
with vexatious deliberation, “we have been 
pals from boyhood. My father was your 
grandfather’s man of business, and was your 
factor till his death. You and I played to¬ 
gether before we were breeched. We went to 
school together, and I spent more holidays at 
Skirl with you than I did at home. So I know 
the ins and outs of your family and its affairs 
practically as well as you do. I know your 
sisters-” 

“ You don’t mean that Ellen has given up 
her Zenana mission work in Burmah, and re¬ 
turned here to England ? ” Drumpipes inter¬ 
posed, with a convulsive catch in his breath. 

“ No; the Lady Ellen, so far as I know, is 



Ma/rch Ha/res. 


193 


still peacefully occupied in harrowing up the 
domestic life of the Orient in her well-known 
and most effective manner.” 

“Well, anything else must be a minor 
evil,” said the Earl, with an accent of relief. 
“ Whichever of the rest of them it is, Davie, I 
tell you at the outset that I wash my hands of 
the business. My sisters rendered the first 
twenty-five years of my life a torment upon 
earth. They bullied me out of all peace in 
life as a youngster; they made my rotten mar¬ 
riage for me; they took my money and then 
blackened my character in reward; they-” 

“ Oh, I know all those gags by heart,” in¬ 
terposed Mos'scrop. “ They’re really very de¬ 
cent bodies, those sisters of yours; if they had 
a fault, it was in believing that they could 
make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear. But it’s 
not about them at all that I was speaking. 
The point is, Archie, that I have made the 
acquaintance of Mr. Laban Skinner and his 
extremely attractive daughter.” 

The Earl took in this intelligence with 
ponderous slowness. He sipped at his glass in 



194 


Ma/rch Hares. 


silence, and then stared for a little at his 
friend. “Well, what is there so alarming 
about that ? ” he demanded at last, roughen¬ 
ing his voice in puzzled annoyance. “ They’re 
respectable people, aren’t they? And what 
the deuce are you driving at, anyway ? ” 

“ Ah, if you take that tone with me, old 
man, I pull out of the affair at once.” 

Drumpipes scowled. “ What affair ? How 
do you know there is any affair! And what 
business have you got being in it, if there is an 
affair? You’re over-officious, my friend. You 
take too much on yourself.” 

Mosscrop laughed with tantalising enjoy¬ 
ment in his eyes. “ Confess that you think of 
making a Countess of the lady.” 

“Well, and what if I do?” the Earl re¬ 
torted. “ Damn it all, man, I haven’t to ask 
your leave, have I ? And, come now, I put it 
to you straight, have you ever seen a finer 
woman in your life ? ” 

David lifted his brows judicially, and held 
his head to one side. “ Oh, I’m not saying 
she’s amiss—in externals,” he admitted. 



Ma/rch Ha/res, 


195 


“ Man, she’s wonderful! Just wonder¬ 
ful ! ” cried the other. “ Did you mind her 
walk ? It is as if she’d never been outside a 
palace in her life. And the face, the eyes, the 
colour, the figure—what Queen in Europe can 
match them ? Man, since I first laid eyes on 
her, I’ve not been myself at all. The thought 
of her bewitches me. I hardly know what 
I’m doing. I’ve been to-day to my tailor’s, 
and I gave him orders that fair took his breath 
away. The most expensive clothes, and even 
furs, I ordered with as light a heart as if it were 
a matter of sixpences. The man knows me 
from childhood, and he gazed at me as if I was 
clean daft. He was shaking his head to him¬ 
self when I came away. Oh, I’m quite a dif¬ 
ferent person, I assure you. I literally hurl 
money about me, nowadays.” 

“ You must indeed be in love,” said Moss- 
crop. “ The father—he gives one the notion 
of a man of wealth.” 

The Earl’s face glistened. “He’s in the 
Standard Oil Company ! ” he whispered, im¬ 
pressively. 



196 


March Ha/res. 


This fact created an atmosphere of digni¬ 
fied solemnity for itself. The two men looked 
at each other gravely for a while, saying noth¬ 
ing. Then the Earl, with a contemplative air, 
refilled his glass. 

“She is the most beautiful woman I’ve 
ever known,” he said, earnestly; “ and I think 
she will marry me.” 

“Physical beauty and Standard Oil do 
make an alluring combination,” remarked 
David philosophically ; “ but-” 

“ Oh, there are no ‘ buts,’ ” Drum- 
pipes insisted. “ She’s as fine in mind 
and temper as she is in body. I’m very 
particular about intellect, as you know, 
and I’ve studied her closely. She has a 
very sound brain, Davie—for a woman. 
But how on earth did you come to stumble 
upon them ? ” 

Mosscrop did not explain. “ The thing 
that impressed me about her, curiously 
enough,” he said, with tranquil discursiveness, 
“was her extremely democratic aversion to 
our ranks and hereditary titles. She and her 




March Hares. 


197 


father seem to be the most violent anti-aristo¬ 
crats I ever knew.” 

“ Yes, that is a trifle awkward,” the Earl 
admitted. “ I don’t think it’s more than 
skin-deep with the old man, but Adele—that’s 
her name, as beautiful as herself, isn’t it ?— 
she’s tremendously in earnest about it. That 
has rather queered my pitch—I haven’t told 
them, you know, about the title and all that. 
They know me just as simple Mr. Linkhaw.” 

“ ‘ Simple ’ is so precisely the word,” com¬ 
mented Mosscrop. 

“ Well, what was I to do ? ” the other pro¬ 
tested in self-defence. “ I was travelling un¬ 
der that name in Kentucky—went there to 
look at a big sale of thoroughbreds, you know 
—and met the father, and then I met the girl, 
and they had me to their house in the country 
—a magnificent place, by George—and she 
had so much to say against the classes here, 
and took such a strong position against titles 
and all that—why, I would have been a jug¬ 
gins to tell her at the start; and after, it 
gradually occurred to me that I wouldn’t say 



198 


Ma/rch Ha/res. 


anything at all, but just go on and win her as 
plain Mr. Linkhaw. Then I could be sure I 
was being loved for myself alone, couldn’t I ? ” 

“Your sentimentality is most touching,” 
said David; “ but I fear it will cost you 
heavily.” 

“Oh, by the way, yes,” remarked Drum- 
pipes, collecting his thoughts; “ you said 
something awhile ago about there being a 
bother of some sort. What is it ? ” Then an 
idea occurred to him, and he lifted his head 
eagerly. “ You haven’t gone and blabbed 
about me, have you—told her who I was, and 
all that ? ” 

“ Quite the contrary,” smiled David. “ It 
was she who recognised me, at once as the Earl 
of Drumpipes. It seems you showed her my 
picture on shipboard, and told her who I was, 
and all about me. Do you recall the inci¬ 
dent ? ” 

The Earl nodded, foolishly. “ It’s my con¬ 
founded imagination,” he groaned. “ I’m al¬ 
ways making an ass of myself like that. God 
only knows why I should have gone out of my 



March Ha/res, 


199 


way to invent that idiotic rubbish. But you 
get awfully hard up for conversation on ship¬ 
board, you know. And so it all came out, and 
she’s chuckling to think what a clumsy liar 
and guy I made of myself—and I’ve gone and 
ordered all those clothes—and ” 

“Be reassured, most noble Thane,” cried 
David, gaily. “ There has been no disclosure. 
Nothing came out. I accepted the situation. 
I did not for an instant betray you. I said, 
‘Certainly: I am the Earl of Drumpipes,’ 
without so much as the flicker of an eyelid. 
There’s friendship for you, if you like.” 

“And did she believe—” the Earl began 
to ask. Then he choked with rising mirth, 
gasped, rolled about in his chair, and finally 
burst forth in resounding laughter. “ She 
thinks you—you ”—he started out again, and 
once more went off in loud merriment. “ It’s 
the funniest thing I ever heard of,” he mur¬ 
mured at last, restoring his composure with 
difficulty, and grinning at Mosscrop through 
eyes wet with joyful tears. 

“ It delights me to see how keenly the 



200 


Ma/rch Ha/res. 


humorous aspect of the matter appeals to 
you,” observed David, “because there is an¬ 
other phase of it which may seem to be de¬ 
ficient in gaiety.” 

“ No; you as the Earl, that’s too funny! ” 
persisted Drumpipes, with a fresh outbreak of 
laughter. But this somehow rang a little false 
at the finish. A half-doubtful look came into 
his eyes, and sobered his countenance. “ But 
you’ll stand by me in this thing, old man, now 
that you’ve begun it, won’t you ? ” he asked, in 
in an altered tone. 

“ But I didn’t begin it,” David pointed out 
calmly. “ You began it yourself, and she took 
it up of her own accord. I’ve simply sacri¬ 
ficed myself in your interest. I stood still, 
and heard my motives aspersed, my character 
vilified, my objects in life covered with con¬ 
tumely, all on account of your hereditary 
crimes, and took it all like a lamb. But to 
assume that I’m going to do this again, or in¬ 
definitely, is another matter. I don’t mind 
submitting to a single temporary humiliation 
for a friend’s sake, but to make a profession of 





March Ha/res. 


201 


it is too much. If it were even a decent full¬ 
blown peerage it might be different, but to be 
traduced for nothing better than a Scotch title 
—no, thank you! ” 

“You’re not the friend I took you for,” 
commented the Earl, in depressed tones. 
“For that matter,” he added, defiantly, “we 
were Pilliewillies in Slug-Angus before the 
Campbells were ever heard of, or the Gordons 
had learnt not to eat their cattle raw. And 
no Linkhaw has ever said to a Mosscrop, ‘ I 
see you’re in a hole and I’ll leave you 
there.’” 

David smiled. “No, you would always 
give a hand—for a fixed price. Well, Archie, 
I’m not saying I won’t see you through all 
this, but there must be conditions. And 
there must be a plan. What on earth do 
you intend to do ? ” 

“Well, my idea is,” the other answered, 
hesitatingly, “ that I should ask her to be my 
wife while she still supposes I am merely Mr. 
Linkhaw. She is like all American girls in 
this, that she believes entirely in love matches. 



202 


Ma/pch Hares, 


So if she will marry me as Mr. Linkhaw, it 
will signify that she loves me. Very well then, 
that being the case, I can say to her afterward 
that I ventured upon a trifling deception, solely 
to have the chance to win the woman I wanted, 
and to make sure that I was being loved for 
myself alone. And then, hang it all, I don’t 
believe it lies in any woman’s skin to be angry 
at flnding that she’s been made a countess un¬ 
awares. If I said I was an Earl and turned 
out not to be one, then she’d have a grievance, 
but it’s the other way about.” 

“ Precisely,” put in David, “ that particu¬ 
lar ignominy is reserved for me. But suppose 
she doesn’t accept you.” 

“That’s hardly worth supposing. It’s as 
good as understood between us, I think, that 
she will accept me.” 

“ But then suppose she jilts you, after you 
disclose to her that you are not plain Mr. 
Linkhaw.” 

“ If that’s well managed, I’m not afraid of 
it, either. You see, her father’s not an out- 
and-out American. He was really born in 



March Hares, 


203 


England, and went out there as a boy. That’s 
a very curious thing, you know. Englishmen 
who go there, and like the place, get to be 
more American than the Yankees are them¬ 
selves. But they don’t change their blood, do 
they? And women are pretty much alike, 
too, whatever their blood may be. They’re all 
organised to stand a coronet on the corner of 
their pocket handkerchiefs. No, it’ll be all 
right, if only you stay by me.” 

“ Ah, now we come to realities,” said Moss- 
crop, genially. “ It’ll be rather an expensive 
business, Archie. I have very high notions, 
my friend, as to the scale on which an Earl 
should comport himself. I could not dream 
of doing the thing on the thrifty and. con¬ 
tracted basis which suits you. The task is a 
difiBcult one to me. I shall have to sit and 
look entirely devoid of mental sensations of 
any sort for hours at a time. I know nothing 
of football and cricket, and have not the name 
of a single jockey on my tongue; this will 
render conversation an embarrassing matter 
for me. I shall suffer continually from the 
14 



204 


March Hares, 


knowledge that I am being regarded as a 
vicious fool, a rake, a gambler, and libertine of 
the most heartless description, and this will 
wear a good deal on my nerves. Compensa¬ 
tion of some sort I must have. Now, I enter¬ 
tain the theory that a nobleman should never 
have any small change about him at all. Tips 
to waiters I would make a great point of. 
They should invariably be of gold. To slip a 
sovereign into a hall-porter’s hand is also a 
valuable action. His subsequent demeanour 
gives the cue to the attitude of the whole 
visible world toward you. A four-in-hand to 
Brighton is good substantial form, too, if 
enough pains be taken with the outfit. A 
private hansom in town is, of course, indis¬ 
pensable. I realise, Archie,” he concluded’ 
apologetically, “ that I am not displaying a 
specially comprehensive grasp of the require¬ 
ments of rank. I can only think of a few 
things now, on the spur of the moment; but I 
will concentrate all my energies on the task 
once I take it up in earnest. You may trust 
me to rise to the occasion. I will be a noble- 



Ma/rch Ha/res, 


205 


man that mere baronets will turn round in the 
street to look after.” 

Drumpipes exhibited a wan and troubled 
smile. “ You’d have your joke, Davie, out of 
any man’s distress,” he said, weakly. 

“Joke!” cried Mosscrop. “You make a 
woful error there, Archie. ^N’ever was man 
more serious.” 

“ But there’d be no opportunity for you to 
spend money, or display yourself,” urged the 
other. “ Not, of course, that I would be¬ 
grudge a pound or two, more or less, if there 
were a real need of it. But in this case, the 
whole point is that you should lie low, and not 
be seen any more. There is no necessity that 
she should meet you again. In fact, the more 
I think of it, the clearer it is that she shouldn’t. 
It might spoil everything, don’t you see ? ” 

“ Oh no, my lad ! ” rejoined David, cheer¬ 
fully. “ I’m not of the hermit variety of 
aristocrat. I’m the kind of Earl who’s on the 
spot, and who lets people know that he is 
present. I will have rings on my fingers and 
bells on my toes. I will—why, let me see! ” 



206 


March Hares, 


His face brightened at some wandering 
thought. “Why, man, I have a birthday in 
six days’ time! That’s it, the 24th. I knew 
there was the difference of a ynar lacking a 
week between us. She read it to me this morn¬ 
ing out of the peerage—August 24th. Very 
well, then, I will celebrate the anniversary as 
it has never been celebrated before. I will 
provide an entertainment for my immediate 
friends upon a scale befitting my position and 
the importance of the event commemorated. 
What do you think of a special saloon-carriage 
to Portsmouth, and a dinner on my yacht, eh? 
One could be hired and manned for the occa¬ 
sion, and a staff of cooks and servants sent 
down from an hotel here. Or could you get 
them in Portsmouth? Does anything more 
appropriate occur to you ? ” 

“ Gro on with your jest,” replied the other, 
sullenly. “All I can say is, it’s in damned 
bad taste, though. Here I am in this predica¬ 
ment, and you pour vinegar into my wounds 
instead of oil.” 

“ Standard Oil, I assume that you refer to. 



Ma/rch Hares. 


20 ^ 


No, you shall have the oil, Archie. You shall 
be my guest on the occasion, and you shall 
meet Mr. and Miss Skinner. We four will 
constitute the party ; ' and I will provide such 
an engaging spectacle of the nobleman, the 
bearer of hereditary dignities and titles, seen 
close at hand among his intimate friends, that 
the lady will be moved to admiration. She 
will say, ‘ Ah, I never guessed before how de¬ 
lightful an Earl could be, how perfect in man¬ 
ners, how admirable in tact, how superb in his 
capacity as host.’ I will reconcile her to the 
aristocracy en llocP 

“Say, you know,” interposed Drumpipes, 
“ I’m not sure there isn’t something in that.” 

“ Something in it ? My dear sir, it’s 
rammed with fructifying probabilities. I give 
this party, and I do it as an Earl should do 
things. I exert myself to fascinate this trans- 
Atlantic twain. I lead their imaginations 
captive to my hereditary seductiveness. I 
make them feel that to be the guests of an 
Earl is more than beauty and fine raiment 
and Standard Oil. I excite them to a warm 



208 


March Hares, 


glow of tenderness toward feudalism, a mood 
that melts at mere thought of the mediasval. 
At that psychological moment you Jump in 
and intimate that you’re something of an Earl 
yourself—and there you are! ” 

Drumpipes nodded approving comprehen¬ 
sion, while he pondered the project thus out¬ 
lined. “ I’m not sure I don’t like the scheme,” 
he repeated. “ It’s risky, though. She’s fear¬ 
fully keen of scent, that girl is. If you didn’t 
play it for all you were worth, every minute, 
she’d twig the thing like a shot. You’d leave 
her with me a good deal, wouldn’t you, and 
devote yourself to the old man ? That would 
be the safest, you know.” 

“ That would hardly do. It wouldn’t be 
in character. When an Earl is giving a party, 
and there is a beautiful young woman about, 
he doesn’t go and talk with windy old fossils 
in frock-coats. It would look unnatural. It 
might as like as not excite suspicion. And 
now you’d better clear out. I want to go to 
bed.” 

The Earl rose, stood irresolute for a mo- 



March Hares, 


209 


ment, and then put a hand on Mosscrop’s 
shoulder. “ Davie,” he said gravely, “ there’s 
one thing you must remember. You’re not a 
good man to handle money—if I didn’t know 
your forbears, I’d never credit your being a 
Scot at all—remember, laddie, that those law¬ 
yers have run up terrible bills against me, 
and farm values have all dropped in the most 
fearful fashion, and I’ve not kept so tight a 
hand on the purse-strings of late, myself, as 
usual, and so do this thing as moderately-” 

“ Oh, you be damned ! ” laughed Mosscrop, 
and pushed him from the room. 

When he was alone, the notion of going 
to bed seemed to have lost its urgency. He 
lighted his pipe, and sat down to read Vesta- 
lia’s letter once again. 



CHAPTEE X. 


At breakfast, three mornings later, Mr. 
Laban Skinner and his daughter dallied over 
their plates, and sent the waiter out again 
with some asperity when he, taking it for 
granted they must have finished the meal, 
came in to clear the table. 

Each had been reading a letter, from the 
early morning mail. 

“ It is an invitation from the Earl of 
Drumpipes,” remarked the father, regarding 
his daughter over his pince-nez^ “ expressing, 
in what I am constrained to describe as some¬ 
what abrupt and comnjon-place terms, his de¬ 
sire that we should consider ourselves as his 
guests during the entire day upon the ap¬ 
proaching 24th instant, the occasion being the 
anniversary of his birth.” He handed over 

310 


March Hares, 


211 


the note for her inspection as he spoke. 
“ The impression which his phraseology pro¬ 
duces upon me,” he added, “is that of one 
performing a perfunctory act of courtesy to 
foreigners of his acquaintance, to whom he 
extends the ceremonial proffer of a hospitality 
which he assumes will be declined.” 

“ Oh, not at all, papa,” commented Adele, 
briefly glancing at the note. “ All noblemen 
write in that formal way. It is a part of 
their bringing-up. No; he wants us to come, 
right enough. I have a letter here from Mr. 
Linkhaw, explaining the thing. Of course it 
was a suggestion of his.” 

“ I venture the hope,” said Mr. Skinner, 
“ that he improves the opportunity to also ex¬ 
plain the otherwise unintelligible fact that 
during an entire week we have had neither 
ocular evidence nor any other tangible mani¬ 
festation of his presence upon this side of the 
Atlantic. I do not hesitate to avow my sur¬ 
prise at what, after his manifold and, I might 
say, even importunate professions of eagerness 
to place his services at our disposal in London, 




212 


March Ha/res. 


I find myself unable to refrain from regarding 
as his indifference to our—our being here.” 

“hlo,” said Adele, confidently, “it’s all 
right. He was kept longer in Scotland than 
he expected—very urgent family business of 
some sort—and only arrived in London a 
couple of days ago, and has been up to his eyes 
in work since he came. Besides,” she contin- 
ued with a little smile, “ he is very frank; he 
says he has no clothes fit to go about in Lon¬ 
don with, but his tailor is working at some 
new ones for him day and night, and they are 
promised for the 23d, so that at the birthday 
party next day-” 

“ I am far from presuming, Adele,” inter¬ 
rupted the father, gravely, “ to ascribe to you 
a deficiency or obtuseness of perception where 
considerations of delicacy are involved; but I 
think I am warranted in pointing out that at 
home, at least in the social environment to 
which you have been from your infancy accus¬ 
tomed, a young gentleman would intuitively 
eschew a subject of this nature in his corre¬ 
spondence with a young lady.” 



March Ha/res, 


213 


“ Oh, they’re different here,” explained the 
daughter, with nonchalance. “ They talk 
quite openly over here of lots of things which 
we never dream of mentioning. You remem¬ 
ber that lady in front of us at the theatre last 
night—when the men in their dress suits came 
over to talk with her between the acts—how 
she told them right out, that although it was 
so hot she had to fan herself all the while, still 
her legs felt quite shivery. Now, a speech like 
that would stand Louisville on its head, let 
alone Paris, Kentucky, but here it passes with¬ 
out the slightest notice. It’s the custom of 
the country. I rather like it myself.” 

Mr. Skinner sighed, and pecked timorously 
at his egg with a spoon. “ I am not wanting, 
I trust, in tolerance for the natural divergences 
of habit and manner which distinguish the 
widely-separated branches of the Anglo-Saxon 
race, or in a desire to accommodate myself to 
their peculiarities when I confront them in the 
course of foreign travel; but I with difficulty 
bring myself to contemplate with satisfaction 
the method of partaking of a soft-boiled egg 



214 


March Hares, 


which obtains favour in these islands. To my 
mind, the negation of the principle of a centre 
of gravity involved in the construction of this 
egg cup, combined with the objectionably in¬ 
adequate dimensions of the spoon-” 

“ Dig it out on to your plate, then; the 
waiter won’t come in again till I ring,” sug¬ 
gested the daughter. 

“ I prefer the alternati'^e of abstention,” he 
answered. “ The spectacle of stains upon the 
cloth or upon the plate would be equally sug¬ 
gestive to the servant’s scrutiny.” 

He rose as he spoke. Adele, gathering up 
the letters, did likewise, and rang the bell. 

Mr. Skinner, having glanced out at the 
river panorama from the balcony window for 
a little, and then looked over the market 
columns of a newspaper, turned again to his 
daughter. 

“ I gather that we are to accept the invita¬ 
tion of the Earl of Drumpipes,” he remarked, 
tentatively. 

Adele nodded. “ Why, of course,” she 
said; “ that’s to be the formal beginning of 



Ma/rch Hares, 


215 


everything. It is intended to make our posi¬ 
tion here perfectly regular. Lord Drumpipes 
is the head of Mr. Linkhaw’s family. It is 
entirely becoming that he should take the 
initiative in recognising us.” 

“ Ah yes, in recognising us,” he repeated. 
“ I suppose, Adele, it would he futile for me 
to recur to the question whether you have 
sujfficiently weighed the opposing considera¬ 
tions with regard to Mr. Linkhaw, and 
the-” 

“ Mercy, yes ! ” interposed Adele, with 
promptitude. “ Don’t let’s have that all over 
again. I’ve quite settled everything in my 
own mind.” 

“ Since I was afforded the opportunity of 
personally observing and conversing with the 
Earl of Drumpipes,” pursued the father, “ and 
of thus forming authoritative conclusions as to 
the British nobility in general, I have devoted 
much thought to the subject. While I do not 
suggest that my well-known views upon the 
aristocratic institution, as a whole, have under¬ 
gone any perceptible transformation, I do not 



216 


Manrch Hares, 


shrink from the admission that the thought 
of being connected by marriage with the bearer 
of an hereditary title no longer presents itself 
to me in such repulsive colours as was former¬ 
ly the case. If, therefore, with your undoubted 
advantages, it should occur to you to entertain 
the idea of a possible alliance with the nobil¬ 
ity, I would not have you feel that my convic¬ 
tions formed a necessarily insuperable barrier 
to-”, 

“ No, no! ” the daughter broke in, with a 
laugh. “ I’ll promise to disregard your con¬ 
victions as much as you like. But now I want 
you to go out, and kill time by yourself some¬ 
where till luncheon. I want to be left alone. 
There is some place where elderly American 
gentlemen can go, isn’t there, without getting 
into mischief ? Oh yes, you must go, and not 
just downstairs to hang about the hotel en¬ 
trance, but straight away somewhere. Why ? 
My dear papa, I have my secrets as well as 
you.” 

“But that secret of mine,” he protested 
feebly, “ I assure you, Adele, that it is really 




Ma/rcJi Hares, 


217 


nothing at all. That is, it does involve mat¬ 
ters both interesting and important; but the 
fact that I am precluded from mentioning 
them is in the nature of a pure accident, and 
wholly without significance.” 

“ Good-bye till luncheon time,” answered 
Adele, with affable firmness. “ And mind you 
quit the premises.” 

Mr. Skinner found his hat, smiled dubi¬ 
ously at his daughter, and without further 
parley took himself off. 

Adele, left alone, looked at the watch in 
her girdle, and compared its record with that 
of the ornate clock on the mantel. She took 
up the paper and ran an aimless eye over one 
page after another. Then she walked about 
with a restless movement, pausing from time 
to time to bend a frowning yet indifferent in¬ 
spection upon the scene spread out beyond the 
balcony. 

At last there came a tap on the door, and 
at sound of this, even as she called out a 
clear, commanding “ Come ! ” she withdrew 
all signs of perturbation, or of emotion of 



218 


Ma/rch Ha/res, 


any sort, from her beautiful dark counte¬ 
nance. 

It was Vestalia who entered the room— 
Vestalia, clad in daintily unpretentious and 
becoming garments, neatly gloved, and with 
much radiant self-possession upon her pretty 
face. She paused upon the threshold, nodded 
rather than bowed to her hostess, and let a 
little smile sparkle in her eyes and play about 
her rosebud of a mouth. 

“ Your father does not succeed very well in 
keeping his secrets, I observe,” she remarked, 
pleasantly, by way of an overture to conversa¬ 
tion. 

“ Won’t you please to be seated,” said 
Adele, with exaggerated calmness. She her¬ 
self took a chair, and slowly surveyed her vis¬ 
itor as she went on: “ My father has no se¬ 
crets from me. He tries to have—once in a 
blue moon—but it doesn’t come off. I may 
tell you frankly, however, that he has in this 
case told me nothing. I found your address, 
and other information, in looking through his 
pockets. I am under no obligation to tell you 



March Ha/res, 


219 


this: I simply feel like it, that’s all. I hate 
dissimulation.” 

“ And I suppose you have your things made 
up without pockets,” suggested Vestalia, ami¬ 
ably. 

Adele put some added resolution into her 
glance. “I wrote asking you to call,” she 
said coldly, “because it became a nuisance 
not to know what you were up to.” 

“ Ah,” replied Vestalia, “ it looks as if your 
father must have destroyed some of our cor¬ 
respondence. How thoughtless of him! ” 

Miss Skinner paused, and knitted her 
queenly brows a trifle. She did not seem to 
be getting on. “ I have no wish to waste 
time in trying to be funny,” she avowed, after 
some hesitation. “Now that you are here, 
have you any objection to telling me why you 
swore my father to keep a secret from me ? ” 

“ Oh, just a whim of mine, nothing more,” 
Vestalia assured her, lightly. “I frequently 
have notions like that, that I can’t in the least 
account for.” 

“ No, you had a reason,” insisted the other, 
15 



220 


March Hares. 


with gravity. “ And you must tell me what it 
was. I have been frank with you.” 

“And I will not be behind you in can¬ 
dour,” said Vestalia, as if won by an appeal to 
her better self. “It was because you looked 
at me in the Museum as if you thought my 
hair was dyed.” 

“Well, so it is, isn’t it?” demanded Adele, 
bluntly. 

“ Upon my honour, no! ” the other replied. 
“ And now you look at me as if you thought 
that that wasn’t much to swear by. It’s pos¬ 
sible that you do not realise it, but your eyes 
leave something to be desired in the matter of 
politeness.” 

“I’m afraid that’s true,” Adele assented. 
“ I have an effect of looking very hard at 
things, simply because I’m near-sighted. I 
ought to wear glasses, but they do not suit 
me.” 

“Yes,” said Vestalia, with a meditative 
look, “ it would be a pity for you to put them 
on. They would detract from your face. It 
is very beautiful as it is—for a dark style.” 



Ma/rch Ha/res, 


221 


“ Sometimes I feel that I am almost tired 
of being dark/’ confessed Adele. “ Your hair 
is the most wonderful thing I ever saw. I 
could see that your gentleman-friend at the 
Museum admired it immensely.” 

“ Oh yes, he said so repeatedly,” Yestalia 
replied, with a demure display of pleasure at 
the recollection. 

Again there was a little pause. Then Miss 
Skinner essayed another opening. “ Your 
name—Peaussier—would indicate French ex¬ 
traction,” she remarked. “ And French people 
are so very dark, as a rule, aren’t they ? My 
mother was a Creole—from Louisiana, you 
know—and I suppose that accounts for my 
colour.” 

“Well, my mother was Scotch,” explained 
Vestalia, “ and they are sandy.” 

“The Scotch gentleman that you were 
with at the Museum—he was decidedly a dark 
man,” suggested Adele, with a casual man¬ 
ner. 

“ Now that I think of it, so he was,” said 
Vestalia. 



222 


March Ha/res, 


The measured and ceremonious ticking of 
the expensive clock on the mantel had the si¬ 
lence to itself for a space, while the two ladies 
looked at each other. 

“ So you won’t tell me anything ? ” Miss 
Skinner exclaimed at last. 

“ The trouble is, don’t you see, that I am 
quite in the dark as to what you want to 
know. If you will tell me just what was in 
your father’s pockets, I can judge then what 
gaps exist in your information.” 

Adele laughed aloud. “ I believe you are 
really a tip-top good fellow, in spite of every¬ 
thing,” she declared. “ Do tell me what it is 
you are doing! I assure you you’re utterly 
wrong in thinking that I am a person to guard 
against, to keep secrets from. Come, don’t 
you see how much I really like you? And 
you won’t trust me 1 I suppose it is the 
blonde temperament, suspicious and unrespon¬ 
sive and calculating. Or no, I don’t mean 
that, you know I don’t, but you might repose 
more confidence in me, when I have told you 
everything.” 



March Hares, 


223 


“ Everything ? ” murmured Vestalia, 

sweetly. 

“ About papa’s pockets, you know.” 

“Ah, yes.” 

“ It was all your fault,” urged Adele. “ It 
was you who drove me to it. And if you don’t 
tell now, goodness only knows what crimes I 
may not be driven to commit, in addition.” 

“ Let me hasten to avert this woful catas¬ 
trophe,” cried Vestalia. “ The matter is sim¬ 
plicity itself. I am by profession, trade, 
whatever you call it, a tracer of pedigrees, 
genealogies. I served my apprenticeship un¬ 
der an American lady, who worked entirely 
for American customers. She is dead now, 
and the business is broken up, and I have 
been idle for a long time. When I saw your 
father and heard his name, a thought occurred 
to me. I know a good deal about the Skin¬ 
ners in England.” 

“ Papa was born in England himself, you 
know,” interposed Adele, with rising interest. 

“ Yes, I know,” Vestalia went on. “ As I 
said, I have exceptional sources of information 



224 


Ma/rch Hares. 

about the family, and it occurred to me that 
very likely he would be glad to have the records 
searched, and a full pedigree drawn up. I 
wrote to him, accordingly—he had mentioned 
this hotel—and I came and saw him downstairs 
in the reception-room, and he seemed delighted 
with the idea, and gave me a commission at 
once. What was more important still, he was 
kind enough to pay me something in advance. 
It came just at the moment to—to supply a 
very urgent want, too, I can tell you.” 

“Ah, poor girl!” said Adele, tenderly. 
“ But why on earth were you afraid that 1 
should know ? I don’t believe your story about 
the hair, you know.” 

“ Eeally it was that,” protested Vestalia. 
“ I could see that you didn’t like me. I was 
afraid of you—that is, of your prejudicing 
your father against me. And if you only knew 
how desperately I was in need of the job! 
Don’t you remember, you did look very sharply 
at me.” 

“ If I did, it was because I was surprised to 
—to—see who you were with.” 






March Hares, 


225 


“How do you mean?” queried Vestalia, 
puzzled. “We were both entire strangers to 
you, surely.” 

“No. I recognised the gentleman from a 
picture I had seen of him. I had a kind of 
idea that he was not precisely a nice gentleman 
for you to be with.” 

“ Then you had a preposterous and wickedly 
mistaken kind of idea,” said Vestalia, with de¬ 
cision. “ There isn’t a truer or nobler-spirited 
gentleman on this earth than he is. I have 
reason to know what I say. If anybody has 
told you otherwise, you have been lied to, that’s 
all.” 

“ Dear, dear, how much you are in earnest,” 
cried Adele. “ You must be my friend, and 
defend me behind my back like that, too. If 
he liked your hair immensely, why, so do I.” 

“ Don’t let us joke about him,” put in Ves¬ 
talia, with seriousness. “I feel very keenly 
about my obligation to him. He saved my 
life—and—and I’d rather talk about something 
else. We were speaking of the Skinners—and 
their pedigree.” 




226 


March Hares, 


Adele assented, with an inclination of the 
head, to the diversion, though her eyes retained 
their gleam of surprised curiosity. “ Yes, the 
Skinners,” she said, vaguely. 

“I can trace them up to Sir Theobald 
Skinner, Knight, who obtained a grant of the 
Abbey lands of Ooggesthorpe, Suffolk, in 1541 
—who in turn was the grandfather of Walter 
Skinner, who married Elizabeth, daughter and 
co-heir of John Banstock, Esquire, of Meechy, 
Norfolk, and became first Lord Gunser.” 

Adele pricked up her ears. “What is 
that ? Are we related to the nobility ? Oh, 
that is what papa meant by something interest¬ 
ing and important! Who would have supposed 
he could be so sly? Oh, sure enough, that 

would account for-” She broke off short, 

and smiled, first knowingly to herself, then 
with frank cordiality to Vestalia. “ Oh, go 
on,” she urged. “ Tell me about our lords.” 

Vestalia shook her head. “ We—that is, 
you have no lords nowadays,” she admitted, 
ruefully. “The Gunser peerage became ex¬ 
tinct in the male line nearly two hundred years 




Mmch Hares. 


227 


ago. The collateral branches of the family 
sank to be yeomen on the soil their ancestors 
had owned—some of them became even peas¬ 
ants, agricultural labourers. There are no 
prosperous or polite Skinners nowadays—ex¬ 
cept your immediate branch.” 

“And even I haven’t got polite eyes,” 
laughed Adele. “ Yes, I remember papa tell¬ 
ing how poor his people were. He hardly 
knew the taste of meat, he said, till he went to 
America as a boy. And so you have traced all 
his relations out. Are there any cousins or 
near connections living now, do you know? 
He had a brother older than himself, Abram 
was his name, I fancy, and he enlisted in the 
army and went to the dogs, I think. At 
least, father never heard of him after¬ 
ward.” 

“ He is dead,” Vestalia re-assured her. 
“ He did go to the dogs, as you say. He had 
some sons, but they are dead too.” 

“And so there were actually Skinners in 
the peerage! ” mused Adele, aloud. The 
thought seemed to excite her. She rose and 



228 


Mmch Hares, 


looked at herself in the mirror, over Vestalia’s 
head. The latter stood up as well. 

“Oh, must you be going?” said Adele. 
“ There was so much I wanted to say to you. 
We must meet soon again. I am going to in¬ 
sist upon that. You see, I know absolutely 
no one over here of my own sex, except you. 
It will he different in a few days, now, hut 
that won’t make any difference with my liking 
you. Oh, yes—I wanted to ask you—do you 
know a Mr. Linkhaw ? ” 

Vestalia looked blankly at her interrogator 
for a moment, then flushed a little and smiled 
confusedly. “ I have heard the name,” she 
replied, “ but I have never seen the gentleman 
bearing it.” 

Adele drew lier brows together in a half¬ 
frown. “ He is a great friend of the gentle¬ 
man who was with you at the Museum,” she 
said, doubtingly. 

“ Yes, I gathered that,” answered Vestalia. 
“ It was in that way that I heard the name.” 

“ Eeally, how curiously we two are mixed 
up together! ” cried the other, with dawning 



March Hares, 


229 


impatience. “ You could tell me ever so many 
things that I am dying to know, if you only 
chose to. It is provoking to have to grope 
about in the dark like this. And you won’t 
even get vexed with me, and talk hack. Even 
that way I might learn something—and we 
could make it up afterward, as easy as not.” 

“Ah, but that is what I came resolved 
under no circumstances to do,” explained Ves- 
talia, with affable placidity. “ Nothing would 
tempt me to get vexed with you.” 

“ Suppose I insisted upon talking unpleas¬ 
antly about the gentleman at the Museum,” 
suggested Adele, with potential malice in her 
tone. 

“ I don’t say you can’t grieve me and hurt 
me, hut you can’t make me angry with you. 
You see, I know things which you don’t know, 
which would entirely alter your views about 
me, and .about other matters, if you were aware 
of them. So it would be unfair in me to 
blame you for remarks made in ignorance of 
the truth.” 

“ But it is precisely against this ignorance 



230 


Ma/rcTi Ha/res, 


that I protest with all my might! ” said Adele 
with vehemence. “It is that that is unfair. 
It makes me ridiculous.” 

“ I don’t see the sense of it myself,” agreed 
Yestalia, simply. “ I always thought it would 
he the simplest course to tell you everything 
at once. Or no—what have I said ? ” she has¬ 
tened to add, in deprecation of the other’s 
kindling eye; “ I didn’t feel that way at first. 
It was I who originally suggested that you 
shouldn’t be told, at the start. I was afraid 
of you, you know. But now I feel quite dif¬ 
ferently. I would gladly have you know 
everything—hut your father has other views. 
It is his secret, now, much more than it is 
mine. I don’t think there is any reason why 
I shouldn’t tell you that much.” 

“ Oh-h! ” groaned Adele, in wrath at her 
helplessness. “ Well, tell me this, anyway, 
how long is this tomfoolery to be kept 
up?” 

“ No, don’t ask me,” answered Yestalia, 
sympathetically at last. “ I don’t know. I 
can only say that I’m as tired of it now as you 



March Ha/res, 


231 


are. I wish you would believe that. It would 
make me easier in my mind.” 

“ Well, I do believe it, then,” the dark girl 
replied, with impulsive readiness. “ Oh, and 
something occurs to me that I daresay you 
can tell me. You remember the day at the 
Museum. Well, the gentleman who was with 
you called here next day, papa having in the 
meantime seen you secretly, downstairs. Now, 
papa seemed clearly annoyed with that gentle¬ 
man, when he came up and found him here. 
Now, why was that ? ” 

Vestalia reflected. It was evident enough 
that the question honestly puzzled her. “ All 
I can think of,” she replied, after considera¬ 
tion, “ is that your father had taken it for 
granted that this gentleman was my husband 
—and when it came out in our interview that 
he wasn’t then your father questioned me very 
closely about him, and it happened that it was 
a subject upon which I couldn’t very well tell 
him much, and I daresay he formed an unfa¬ 
vourable opinion of Mr. Mosscrop on that ac¬ 
count. That is the only explanation I can 



232 


March Ha/res, 


think of. I know he said he thought it would 
he well for me not to see him again, or even 
hold communication with him—but I did 
write him a letter that very day all the same.” 

It was Adele’s turn to ponder. “But 
why,” she began, hesitatingly, “why should 
papa take it upon himself to tell you what to 
do and not to do ? What business is it of his ? 
And, if he disliked the thing, why should he 
remain friendly to you, and snub the gentle¬ 
man you call Mr. Mosscrop? Not that he 
minded it, or that it amounted to anything, 
but it puzzles me that papa should behave in 
that curious fashion.” 

“ Yes, it would have been more natural to 
show the woman the cold shoulder, and think 
nothing amiss of the man,” assented Vestalia, 
gravely. “ I quite agree with you there.” 

“Well, that is the way of the world, isn’t 
it ? ” put in Adele, in apologetic tones. “ Don’t 
dream that I suggest anything wrong.” 

“ Oh no,” said the other patiently, but with 
a note of weariness in her voice. “ It doesn’t 
matter, one way or the other.” 



March Hares, 


233 


“You love him, then?” Adele’s black 
eyes glowed with a sudden kindly warmth 
which went to Vestalia’s heart.” 

“ Oh, how can I tell you ? ” she faltered. 
“It is all so stupid—and I am so unhappy? 
He was goodness itself to me, and he must 
think that I behaved like a brute—a common 
girl of the streets—or meaner still, for at least 
it’s said they have some sense of gratitude. 
He came like Providence itself to help me, 
when I was absolutely starving and turned out 
of doors like a dog—and I was grateful, and 
yet here he must he thinking that I’m the 
very scum of the earth ! ” 

She gazed at her companion out of swim¬ 
ming eyes, and for answer Adele kissed her. 

“ I will go now,” she stammered, hastily, 
as if the caress had further unnerved her. 
“ I’ve stayed longer than I meant. Yes, I will 
come again—if you tell your father that I’ve 
been, and he says I may come.” 

“ I’d like to see him say anything else ! ” 
cried the young lady from Paris, Kentucky. 
“ The idea! ” 



234 


March Hares, 


And when the door had closed upon 
Vestalia, this dark beauty clenched her hands, 
and strode indignantly about the room, and 
repeated between set teeth, “ The very 
idea! ” 



CHAPTER XL 

Vestalia paused at the street entrance of 
the hotel, and looked doubtfully up the hill 
toward the shifting outline of the strident, 
crowded Strand. 

The prospect repelled her, and she bent 
her slow steps in the other direction. Cross¬ 
ing the empty, sun-baked roadway of the Em¬ 
bankment, she strolled westward in the partial 
shade of the young lime-trees, which maintain 
a temerarious existence along the line of the 
river’s parapet. 

She looked over the stonework to the water 
from time to time as she walked, and every 
glance instinctively wandered up-stream to¬ 
ward the stretch of Westminster Bridge, poised 
delicately in the noonday haze across the body 
of the sleepy flood. The stately beauty of the 

16 235 


236 


Ma/rch Hares, 


opposing piles of buildings which it linked 
one with the other, and brought together into 
the loftiest picture the Old World knows, 
came as she moved toward it to soothe and 
uplift her spirits. Her lips parted with pleas¬ 
ure at the spectacle, and at the thought that 
there, in that glorious span between St. 
Thomas’ and St. Stephen’s, her own romance 
had been born. 

The warm serenity of the scene, the inim¬ 
itable composure of its vast parts, lying under 
the sunshine in such majestic calm, seemed to 
chide the weak flutterings and despondencies 
to which she had surrendered her bosom. The 
romance which absorbed her mind, of which, 
indeed, her whole being had become a portion, 
had its home tlrere, in the heart of that be¬ 
nignant grandeur. The grace and charm and 
noble strength of what she gazed upon re¬ 
buked her timid want of confidence in Des¬ 
tiny, as it shapes itself on Westminster Bridge. 
She walked forward with a firmer step, her 
head up, and her eyes drying themselves by 
the radiance of their own glance. 



March Hares, 


237 


And so, being borne along by the power¬ 
ful spell which this great vista has cast about 
her, she had no sense of surprise when it 
caught up also David Mosscrop in its train, 
and placed him at her side. It was at the 
corner of the bridge, and a momentary clus¬ 
tering of pedestrians brought to a stand-still 
by a policeman’s uplifted hand had diverted 
her thoughts, and then someone touched her 
on the arm. 

She turned and drank in what had hap¬ 
pened with tranquil, tenderly self-possessed 
eyes. She gave no start, as of a mind caught 
unawares. She was conscious of no wonder, 
no tremor of disturbance at the unexpected. 
The luminous regard in which she embraced 
the newcomer was as unreasoningly ready for 
him as are the spontaneous raptures of dream¬ 
land. No words came to her lips, but it was 
in the air that she had known he was com¬ 
ing. 

“ I was just going to hunt a fellow up at 
his club across there,” said Mosscrop, his 
coarser masculine sense suggesting an explana- 



238 


March Hares, 


tion, “ and I chanced to look over here, and I 
made sure it was you, and-” 

He stopped short too, and the slower fires 
kindled in the glance which met hers. They 
looked into each other’s eyes, in a long mo¬ 
ment of silence. He drew her arm in his, 
while the glamour of this sustained gaze rested 
still upon them. Then, with a lengthened 
happy sigh she spoke. 

“I want to go again to that dear little 
place where we breakfasted,” she said softly. 
“ You must let me have my own way. I have 
money in my purse, now, and you must come 
and lunch with me. And it must be—oh, it 
must be there.” 

They drove thither, this time in a high- 
hung, sumptuous, noiseless hansom, which 
sped with an entranced absence of motion 
through the busy streets. 

“ It is like fairyland again,” she whispered, 
nestling against him in the narrow, deeply- 
padded enclosure. And he, resting his hand 
upon hers under the shelter of the 
closed doors, breathed heavily, and mur- 



March Hares, 


239 


mured a cadence without words in ecstatic 
response. 

In some ridiculous fraction of time they 
were at their journey’s end. The impression 
of having travelled on a magic carpet was in 
their minds as, almost ruefully, they woke 
from their day-dream of arrow-flight through 
space, stepped out, and paid the cabman. 
They laughed together at the thought, with¬ 
out necessity of mentioning what amused 
them. Vestalia, before they entered the res¬ 
taurant, drew her companion a few doors up 
the street, and halted before the narrow win¬ 
dow of the old French bootmaker’s shop. 
Here they laughed again, he merrily, she with 
a lingering, mellow aftermath of feeling in her 
tone. 

It was only when they were seated in the 
little room above and she had drawn off her 
gloves, and after a joyous insistence upon do¬ 
ing it all herself, had chosen some dishes from 
the card and sent the waiter off with the order, 
that their tongues were loosened. 

David leaned back in his chair, and beamed 



240 


March Hares. 


broad content. He began to talk in the 
measured, smooth-flowing tone which she re¬ 
membered so well. “ First of all, dear girl,” 
he said, “I want to put on the record my 
boundless delight at flnding you once more. 
I take off my hat to the gods. They have de¬ 
vised in my behalf a boon which swallows up 
all the imaginable ills of a lifetime. I swear 
to complain of nothing they do for the rest of 
my days. They have given you back to me ; 
and if I am dull enough to lose you again, 
why, I will bow my head submissively to the 
deserved mishaps of an ass.” 

The girl’s blue eyes twinkled with a soft, 
glad light. “It is a great joy to hear your 
voice again,” she said, gently. “ The echoes 
of it have kept up a little faint murmur in my 
ears ever since we parted, as if some spirit was 
holding a phantom shell close to my head. 
And now it is as if we hadn’t parted at all, 
isn’t it ?—I mean, for the present.” 

“ Ah, it matters so little what you mean,” 
he replied, in affectionate banter. “l erred 
once, to my profound misfortune, in deferring 



March Hares, 


241 


to your mental processes, and permitting them 
to translate themselves into actions. Do not 
think that I shall be so weak again. The key 
shall never fail to he turned on you here¬ 
after.” 

She laughed gaily, and shook her head in 

playful defiance. “ Ah, but suppose-” she 

began, and then let a glance of merry archness 
complete her sentence. 

“ I confess to curiosity,” he said. “ I 
should prize highly your conception of the 
motives which prompted you to run away 
from me.” 

Her mood sobered perceptibly. “ I did it 
because it was right.” 

“As a mainspring of human action, that 
is inadequate,” he commented. “Almost all 
painful and embarrassing things are right, but 
wise people avoid them as much as possible 
none the less.” 

“ No, it was right for me to go,” she per¬ 
sisted. “ I couldn’t stay and be dependent 
upon someone else, no matter who that some¬ 
one else was. Your kindness to me that whole 



242 


March Hares, 


day was more grateful to me than you can 
think. I was so frightened in that early 
morning there on the bridge, so desolate and 
helpless and sick with dread of what was going 
to become of me, that I didn’t dream of hesi¬ 
tating to take shelter in your—your friend¬ 
ship. It was like going under some hospitable 
roof while there was a drenching rain outside, 
and I was very thankful for the refuge. But 
when it cleared up, I couldn’t go on staying, 
just because I had been made welcome, now, 
could I?” 

“ Since you ask me, I declare with tearful 
emphasis that you could.” 

“No, seriously,” urged Vestalia; “don’t 
you agree with me that women should be just 
as self-reliant and independent as men ? ” 

“ Me ? I agree absolutely. I would have 
women insist upon the most unflinching inde¬ 
pendence, all the world over. I feel so keenly 
on that point, that out of the entire sex I 
would make only one exception. Very few 
people would take such an advanced position 
as that, I imagine. Just fancy how far I go! 



March Ha/res. 


243 


There are hundreds of millions of women, and 
I would have them all independent but just 
one. By a curious accident it happens that 
you are that one—but you will be fair-minded 
enough to recognise, I feel convinced, that 
this is the merest chance.” 

She made a droll little mouth at him, and 
he went on: 

“ Yes, it is very strange. I cannot pretend 
to account for it, but you do undoubtedly form 
an exception to what would otherwise be a 
universal rule. The thought of other women 
earning their own living fills me with joy. I 
am fascinated by it, I assure you. I feel like 
bursting into song at the barest suggestion of 
the idea. But this very excess of reverence 
for the general principle begets a correspond¬ 
ing vehemence of feeling about the one soli¬ 
tary exception. That is in accordance with a 
natural law. Surely you respect natural laws ? 
Well, the vaguest adumbration of an idea of 
your doing things for yourself convulses me 
with rage. The notion that my right to take 
entire charge of you is disputed seems mon- 



244 


Ma/rch Hares, 


strous and abominable to me. It is a denial 
of my mission on earth, and I am bound to 
combat it with all my powers.” 

Vestalia smiled. “I see what you mean. 
You are just an old prehistoric savage like the 
rest of your sex. Your one idea is to drag a 
woman oS into your cave and keep her there, 
with a big rock rolled up in front of the door 
when you’re away.” 

“ I would not have you disparage the 
primitive instincts,” urged Mosscrop, with an 
air of solemnity. “ My word for it, we should 
be an extraordinarily uninteresting lot without 
them. They are the abiding bone and flesh 
and muscle of humanity, upon which it pleases 
each foolish generation in turn to stretch its 
own thin, trivial pelt of fashionable conven¬ 
tion. My desire to seize you, and drag you off 
to my own cave, and make a life’s business of 
keeping you there, always beautiful, always 
happy, always replenishing the well-spring of 
joy in my existence—you choose that as some¬ 
thing typical of the primeval man surviving 
within me. Let me tell you, sweet little Ves- 



March Hares, 


245 


talia, that the human mind would cease to¬ 
morrow from its eternal wistful dream of 
progress if it were not for the hope that ad¬ 
vancing civilisation will bring improved facili¬ 
ties for that sort of thing. The world would 
wilt, and curl up like a sapless leaf, and drop 
from its solar stem into gaseous space, if that 
anticipation were taken away. The race keeps 
itself going only by cherishing the faith that 
sometime, somewhere in the golden future, 
this planet will be arranged so that the right 
woman will always get into the right cave. 
That is what people mean when they speak of 
the millennium.” 

“ That is all very well,” said Vestalia, “ but 
it deals with everything from the man’s point 
of view. Consider the other side of the case. 
What do you say to the woman’s disinclination 
for cave-life—is that not entitled to respect ? ” 

“ Possibly,” answered David, reflectively— 
“ if one were able to believe in it.” 

The waiter entered at this point with a 
burdened tray in his arms, and Vestalia took 
up the wine list. “ Which is it that we had— 



246 


March Hares, 


that in the lovely high green bottles, with 
arms like a vase ? ” she asked Mosscrop. “We 
must have the same again.” 

“You have told me nothing as yet,” said 
David, reproachfully, when they were alone 
again, “of all the thousand things I long to 
know.” 

“ It is so hard to tell,” she explained, with 
hesitation. “ That is, there are things that I 
am supposed not to tell to anybody, at pres¬ 
ent, at least. And as for what I ought not to 
tell you —why I have been instructed to avoid 
you altogether. I was even told not to write 
you—but I did all the same—just once.” 

David took a crumpled envelope from an 
inner pocket over his heart, held it up for her 
inspection, and replaced it. But even as he 
did so sombre shadows began to gather on his 
face. He laid down his knife and fork, and, 
biting his lips, looked out of the window. 

Vestalia swiftly recalled gruesome associa¬ 
tions with that look. She stretched forth her 
hand, and laid it on his arm. “ You mustn’t 
look out there,” she protested. “ It has a bad 



March Hares, 


247 


effect on you. Look me in the face instead— 
please! ” 

He shook his head impatiently, and stared 
with dogged, blinking eyes at the opposite 
roofs. “You don’t realise what it has all 
meant to me,” he said at last, his gaze still 
averted. The quaver in his voice profoundly 
affected the girl. 

“ Listen to me—David,” she said, with 
something of his pathos reflected in her tone. 
“Turn and look at me. I haven’t the heart 
for even a moment of misunderstanding to¬ 
day. There isn’t anything on earth I won’t 
tell you. But you must look at me ! ” 

He slowly obeyed her, and she saw that 
there were tears in his eyes. “ But apparently 
there are things which it would be merciful 
not to tell me,” he said, struggling for an in¬ 
stant for composure. Then his brows knitted 
themselves, and flashes played in the darkness 
of his glance. “Who forbids you this or 
that ? ” he demanded, the angry metallic growl 
rising in his voice. “ Four days ago you were 
all alone in the world ! You told me so! In 



248 


Ma/pch Ha/res, 


detail you assured me of your isolation. What 
are you talking about now? You speak of re¬ 
ceiving instructions—to avoid me altogether, 
to write no letter to me! Oh, I ask for no ex¬ 
planations-” he went on stormily, pushing 

back his chair to rise from the table—“ don’t 
think I claim any right to question you. But 
I find myself mistaken, that is all! I am a 
silly dufier at a game of this sort. I take 
things in earnest, while the others are laugh¬ 
ing in their sleeves. Well, I’ve had my lesson. 
Before God, I’ll never-’’ 

Vestalia screamed at him. She had half- 
risen in her place, gazing with bewildered, 
affrighted eyes, till some vague inkling of his 
meaning dawned upon her brain. “Foolish 
David! Foolish! ” she cried aloud now. 
“Stop it! Stop it! You don’t know what 
you’re saying! Keep still, and let me talk to 
you! ” 

She bent across the table, and peremptorily 
shook his shoulder to enforce her words. 
“You’re all wrong!” she clamoured, as his 
tempest of wrathful words subsided. Upon 



Mmch Hares, 


249 


the silence which followed she implanted 
firmly the added comment : “ Oh, you 
goose! ” 

He looked up sullenly to her, as she stood 
now erect—and, meeting the glance in her 
eyes, felt himself clinging to it. There was 
for him the effect of sunshine in it—of clouds 
parted, of radiance and calm restored about 
him. Breathing hard, he gazed into her face, 
and came somehow to know from what he saw 
in it that he had been making a fool of him¬ 
self. This perception assumed sharp out¬ 
lines in his mind before she had spoken a 
word. 

“ ll^'ow, will you behave yourself, and listen 
to me?” she demanded, with austerity. His 
shattered aspect of contrition was a sufficient 
answer, and she seated herself confidently. 
“ Now I will explain things to you—although 
you don’t deserve it in the very least,” she be¬ 
gan, in formal tones. “ To commence with, 
you remember that American father and 
daughter that we met at the Museum, down in 
the basement?—well, it happened that—hap- 



250 


March Ha/res. 


pened that—Oh, my poor boy, how could you 
think so stupidly of me ? ” 

David had drawn up to his place again. 
He held Vestalia’s hands in his at this junc¬ 
ture, somehow, and the enchanted table nar¬ 
rowed itself until there was no barrier of space 
between their lips. 

The little kiss sweetened the air. The two, 
even while they exchanged a glance of shy sur¬ 
prise, thought of it with reverence. They in¬ 
stinctively gave to its contemplation a moment 
of tender silence. 

“ How shrewd you were in discerning my 
leaven of savagery,” he remarked at last. “ Or 
leaven? we’d better say principal ingredi¬ 
ent ! ” 

“ I like you that way,” said Vestalia, 
quietly. 

He smiled at her in dreamy incredulity. 
“ I wonder if you do,” he mused. “ They say 
women do like men who beat them. The 
police courts seem to support the idea. But 
there is a difficulty, you see. If you liked me 
because I behaved badly to you, then I should 



Ma/rch Ha/res, 


251 


dislike you on precisely that account. So you 
mustn’t suggest approbation. No, I was very 
rude and stupid, and I am profoundly ashamed 
of myself. I should be ashamed to offer an 
excuse, too, if it were not just the one it is. 
I happen to he head over heels in love with 
you, dear little lady.” 

“ And precisely what is that an excuse 
for ? ” demanded the girl, with a fine show of 
ingenuous calm. 

“ For letting my luncheon get cold,” he re¬ 
plied, taking up his fork. 

With the laughter of pleased children, 
they resumed the broken course of the meal. 

“ It doesn’t begin to be as nice as your 
breakfast,” she commented after a little. 

“ I don’t think it is a day for things to 
eat,” he said, pushing the plate aside. “ I 
want to do nothing hut just look at you—per¬ 
haps talk a little—but hear you talk much 
more. I am conscious of an indefinite hunger 
for the mere visual charm of you, sitting there 
opposite me. It seems as if it would take 
years to satisfy that alone. Do you know that 
17 



252 


March Ha/res. 


you are very beautiful, dear, in your new 
clothes ? ” 

She regarded his face with a keen, almost 
anxious glance, before she let the softer look 
dominate her own. “ I am going to hurry to 
tell you where I got them,” she said. “ They 
are the gift of my uncle—my father’s brother. 
This was what I was beginning to explain 
when—when you got so unhappy.” 

“ Yes—that is the merciful word—un- 
happy,” he assented, with gratitude. “ I have 
been deeply out of sorts—mentally—since I 
lost you that night. There is a special devil 
inside of me, Yestalia, who sometimes lies low 
for long periods, and hardly reminds me of 
his existence, but since last Thursday he has 
been out on the war-path, night and day. My 
nerves are stretched like fiddle-strings, just 
with the effort of holding him. The sight of 
you is death to him, dear. He is gone now— 
clean out of existence. And while you stay, 
he won’t return. But the wretch has left 
me tired and a little tremulous. I want to 
rest myself by just looking at you.” 



March Hares, 


253 


She, smiling with demure pleasure at his 
speech and his look, related to him briefly the 
story of the Skinner pedigree. “ It occurred 
to me the minute I woke up in the early 
morning,” she declared. “ I shall always be¬ 
lieve that I really dreamed it flrst. Are you 
interested in dreams ? ” 

“ Oh immensely—at the time.” 

“ No; but there is something in them. I 
assure you, the idea never entered my head the 
day we met them. But before I was fairly 
awake next morning, lo, there it was, all 
worked out. The old gentleman was polite¬ 
ness itself. He came down immediately, when 
I sent my note upstairs. When I told him 
about wanting to make a pedigree of the 
Skinners, the notion appealed to him at once. 
Then I told him about something else, and 
that appealed to him a good deal more.” 

Vestalia paused here, and began to regard 
her companion with signs of diminishing con¬ 
fidence. “ I can’t go any farther without mak¬ 
ing a most humiliating confession to you,” she 
faltered. 



254 


March Hares, 


“ Then don’t go any farther, I beseech 
you,” he answered. “ Truly, I do not find 
myself stirred very much by this entire dem¬ 
onstration of your ability to do things off your 
own bat. It is independent and praiseworthy 
and all that, no doubt, but I still have a linger¬ 
ing feeling that you ought to have stayed to 
breakfast, you know, and left mere commercial 
details to me. And I certainly shrink from 
humiliating confessions. Skip the unpleasant 
parts. We will have no skeletons at our feast 
to-day.” 

“Ah, but they can’t be skipped,” sighed 
Vestalia. She drew nearer to him, across the 
table, and lowered her voice. “ I foolishly told 
you some things that were not so—that first 
morning,” she confided in doleful tones. “ It 
was a kind of romance about myself that I had 
built up in my own mind, and without much 
thought I gave it to you as truth. So long as 
I kept it to myself it did no harm; it even 
made life easier and more endurable for me, 
like a poor child making-believe that she and 
her rag doll are princesses. But it was differ- 



March Hares. 


255 


ent to tell you. My father was not a French 
gentleman. He was not an officer, and he 
wasn’t killed in a duel. He was never in 
France any more than I was. My mother was 
Scotch, hut she did not belong to any noble or 
wealthy family. She did not leave any family 
jewels with a crest on them, and no one 
cheated her out of a private fortune, because 
she never had such a thing. It was just my 
individual fairyland that I described to you as 
real. I didn’t even tell you my true name.” 

David smiled solace upon her distressed 
aspect. “ You speak as if it were of impor¬ 
tance. Dear child, do we value a rare and 
beautiful lily the less, because the gardener 
has put the wrong label on it by mistake? 
Tut—tut! Names and lineage and all that— 
it is the idlest stuff on earth to me. The story 
that you told me was pleasant in my ears only 
because it came from your lips. The discovery 
now that it was all yours—that it was not the 
mere recital of dull facts, but was the child of 
your own inner imaginings—why that only 
makes it the more delightful to me. I simply 



256 


Ma/rch Ha/res. 


gave it store-room in my memory before; I 
love it now—and at the same time I find I 
have quite forgotten it. There is a paradox 
for you! ” 

Vestalia essayed a smile through her tears. 
“You are always kinder than even I expect 
you to be,” she faltered; “ but I did tell you a 
—a story, and by rights you should be very 
angry with me.” 

David laughed. “ Hans Christian Ander¬ 
sen told me many stories, but I worshipped 
him increasingly to the end. Dear lady, the 
stories are the only veritable things in life. 
The alleged realities of existence pass by us, or 
roll over us, and leave us colourless and empty. 
The genuine possessions of our souls — the 
things that shape and decorate and furnish 
our spiritual habitations—are the things that 
never happened. I note a twinkle in your eye. 
You fancy that I have said an inept thing. 
You think that I shall have to go back and 
explain that at least what has happened to us 
forms an exception to the rule. Ah, sweet 
little Vestalia, have you forgotten your own 



Ma/rch Ha/res, 


257 


remark, here in this very room ? ‘ It isn’t like 
real life at all,’ you said; ‘ it is the way things 
happen in fairy tales.’ I take my stand upon 
that definition. We have deliberately repudi¬ 
ated what are described as the realities of life. 
We discard them, cut them dead, decline to 
have anything whatever to do with them. We 
declare that it is fairyland that we are living 
in, and that we refuse to come out of it to the 
end of our days.” 

Vestalia gazed into his eyes with wistful 
tenderness. “To the end of our days!” she 
murmured softly, wonderingly. Then she re¬ 
called the task still unfinished. “ I took the 
name of Peaussier,” she forced herself to con¬ 
tinue, “ because it was a translation of my 
own name. I looked in the dictionary, and 
found that it was the French for Skinner.” 

David lifted his brows. “ You don’t mean 
-” he began, confusedly. 

“ Yes; ” she forestalled his question. “ The 
old gentleman at the Savoy is my father’s own 
brother. My father was Abram Skinner. He 
was not a lucky man, or, in his later years, a 



258 


March Hares, 


very nice man either. He was always poor, 
and toward the end he was in other troubles 
too. My home was a thing to shudder at the 
recollection of. I ran away from it after 
mother died, and he’s gone, too, now. I 
changed the name, to wash my hands of the 
whole miserable thing. And then to think of 
the wonderful chance—to stumble upon my own 
uncle, a man of fortune and education, and the 
kindest heart alive—is it not the most extraor¬ 
dinary thing that ever happened in this world ? ” 
•‘Very possibly it might be regarded as ex¬ 
traordinary—out in the so-called world,” Da¬ 
vid assented, reflectively. “ But it is just the 
thing that would be expected in fairyland. 
Yes, it seems, on the face of it, a beneficent 
occurrence. It is good for you to be seized 
and possessed of a rich uncle—from some 
points of view. But from others—a doubt 
suggests itself, Vestalia, whether your uncle 
is well-affected toward the fairies. Standard 
Oil does not lend itself without an effort to 
the fantastic. What if your uncle beckons 
you to come forth from fairyland ? ” 



March Hares. 


259 


“ And leave you behind—is that what you 
mean ? ” asked Vestalia, slowly. “ That would 
depend—depend on how much you wanted 
me to stay.” 

David put out his left hand to take hers, 
where it lay upon the cloth. With his right 
he drew out his watch. “ The name Skinner,” 
he said, “ is all right for the folk at the Savoy. 
It is not a suitable name for you. I sympa¬ 
thise fully with your impulse to abandon it. 
The expedient which you adopted was, no 
doubt, the best that offered itself at the mo¬ 
ment, but I think I know a better. I must 
leave you now, and hurry into the City. This 
is Monday. Dear love, on Thursday I claim 
the whole day from you. We will breakfast 
here at eight—it is not too early, is it?—or 
say rather that at just eight I will come and 
find you on Westminster Bridge. The day 
must begin there, mustn’t it ? And—strange¬ 
ly enough—Thursday is in a sort another 
birthday of mine.” 

“And of mine too?” she asked, with a 
light in her eyes. 



CHAPTEE XIL 


In the early afternoon of Thursday, David 
Mosscrop walked apart on shaded gravel-paths, 
beneath arches of roses and the feathered can¬ 
opy of cedars high above, with Adele by his side. 

“ Oh, it’s all right. The waiter will come 
out and tell us when it is ready,” he said re¬ 
assuringly, in comment upon her backward 
glance. “ I want to speak with you. There 
was no such thing as a word with you by your¬ 
self on the road.” 

“ Why, we talked every mortal minute,” 
she protested. 

“ Ah yes, we talked, but I don’t recall that 
anything was said.” 

“ I daresay my conversation is empty to the 
last degree,” she observed ; “ but I am usually 
spared such frank statements of the fact.” 


March Ha/res, 


261 


“ Ah, but I want to be thought of as some¬ 
thing a little different from the usual,” urged 
Dayid. 

“ Your efforts in that direction have been 
extraordinarily successful. Pray, do not im¬ 
agine that they are unappreciated. I admit 
freely that you seem to have quite exhausted 
the unusual, my Lord.” 

“ No; I’ve still got something up my 
sleeve,” said David, lightly enough. But the 
tone in which she had uttered those final two 
words caught his attention. They carried a 
suggestion of emphasis which fell outside the 
bounds of genial banter. Meditating upon it 
he stole a covert glance at her, and encountered 
two wide-awake black eyes intently scrutinising 
him in turn. “ It was about that I wished to 
consult you,” he added, conscious of an em¬ 
barrassed tongue. 

“Won’t it be better to stick to scenery?” 
she asked. Yes, there was undoubtedly a 
mocking touch in her voice. “ That is so safe 
a subject. This dear old hotel here, now, how 
perfectly satisfying it is! Those wonderful 



262 


March Hares, 


trees out in front, and the white chalk hill be¬ 
hind, and this garden, and then the comfort 
and charm of everything inside, and the 
thought that people have been coming here for 
hundreds of years, or is it thousands ?—it is so 
different from anything we have in America— 
even in Kentucky. And then the whole drive 
from London—through such delicious country, 
all so riQh and smooth and neatly packed to¬ 
gether, and so full of the notion that people 
are all the while planting and pruning and 
admiring every inch of it that you can’t help 
feeling affectionately toward it yourself ! Per¬ 
haps there is a certain hint of the artificial 
about it, but somehow that seems rather in 
keeping with the day than otherwise, doesn’t 
it, my Lord ? ” 

While he hesitated about an answer, she 
touched him on the arm. “ Here are papa and 
Mr. Linkhaw coming along after us—probably 
to tell us luncheon is ready. Shan’t we wait 
for them ? ” 

“ Heavens, no! ” cried David, starting for¬ 
ward. “We’ve been chained to them on the 



March Hares, 


263 


top of the coach for two whole hours,” he went 
on, in defensive explanation of his warmth. 
“ Eeally, we have earned the right to a few 
quiet words by ourselves.” 

“ Oh, I don’t mind,” said Adele, quicken¬ 
ing her pace to suit his. “ Only it’s fair to 
warn you, though, that my temper has its 
limitations. I am a variable person. Some¬ 
times it happens that all at once I weary of a 
joke, after it has been carried to a certain 
length, and then I can he as unpleasant as they 
make ’em.” 

“ I find that my own sense of humour has a 
tendency to fiag under sustained effort, as I get 
older,” said David. “ But there are so many 
pleasantries afloat—perhaps you wouldn’t mind 
indicating the one which particularly fatigues 
you, and I will put my foot on it at once.” 

“ Oh, by no means ! That would he far too 
crude. We are all your guests, and you are in 
charge of the entertainment, and I couldn’t 
dream of suggesting anything.” 

“ Except that you find yourself no longer 
amused,” ventured David, cautiously. 



264 


Mmch Hares, 


“ Oh, not at all.” She spoke with per¬ 
functory languor, and simulated a little yawn. 
‘‘ I daresay it is all immensely funny, only I 
got up earlier than usual this morning, and 
no doubt that has dulled my wits some¬ 
what.” 

David perceived on the instant how matters 
stood. “ I also rose at an extravagantly early 
hour,” he said, “ and it is about my reasons for 
doing so that I want to tell you. But, first of 
all, let us be frank with each other. I have 
done nothing but accede to a situation created 
for me by Archie and yourself. It has been 
within your power to end it at any moment 
you choose. It has been all along much more 
your joke than mine. It isn’t fair to round 
on me for merely humouring your own con¬ 
ception of sport.” 

Adele halted momentarily, and surveyed 
his composed, swarthy countenance with lifted 
brows. “ So you saw all along that I knew! ” 
she exclaimed, in honest surprise. 

“How could I have imagined that so 
clumsy a performance as mine would deceive 



Ma/t'ch Ha/res, 


265 


so clever a young woman?” lie rejoined, with 
a sprightly bow. 

“ Oh, you did it awfully well,” she assured 
him, complacently. “ But tell me, did Archie 
suspect that / knew ? ” 

“I have been intimate with Archie from 
the cradle,” said David, “ but I am still very 
shy about forming opinions as to his mental 
processes. In this case, however, I think it is 
safe to say he didn’t suspect—and still doesn’t 
suspect.” 

“Poor old Archie,” mused Adele, with a 
ripening smile. “ I knew who he was before 
I’d even laid eyes on him. A school-friend of 
mine in Galveston wrote to me that she had 
met a real Earl, who insisted on being known 
as Mr. Linkhaw, and that he was returning to 
England by way of Kentucky. I’ve had three 
months of the rarest fun in never letting on 
that I had the remotest suspicion. You can’t 
imagine how comical it was. He used to get 
quite tearful sometimes, I abused the aristoc¬ 
racy so fiercely. And then, the joke was, papa 
began—his whole idea of conversation is to 



266 


Ma/rch Hares, 


take up to-day what I’ve said yesterday, and 
multiply my words by a hundred and twelve, 
and produce the result as his own; and he 
worked up the anti-Earl agitation till Archie 
very nearly went off into chronic melancholia. 
It was better than any comedy that ever was 
written—but then you stumbled your way into 
the middle of it, and got it all twisted and 
tangled up—and it hasn’t been so amusing 
since then.” 

“ My dear Miss Skinner,” protested David, 
“ I think my entrance upon the scene deserves 
a gentler verb. If you will search your mem¬ 
ory, you will find that I came in by express 
invitation. It was you who deliberately thrust 
my mock honours upon me.” 

“ Oh, I know that,” she responded, readily 
enough. “ I thought that would only make 
the thing funnier still—but somehow it hasn’t. 
It isn’t anything about Archie and me, you 
know. But there is another element in the 
case that I feel very keenly about. It has been 
puzzling me for days, but I only learned the 
truth last night. I simply made papa tell me. 



March Hares. 


267 


I refused flat-footed to come here to-day, or to 
do anything else that was reasonable, unless he 
did tell me. I have a cousin here in England, 
Mr. Mosscrop, a daughter of my father’s own 
brother, and she is one of the dearest girls that 
ever lived.” 

“ I can readily credit that,” declared David, 
pointing his meaning with a little inclination 
of the head. 

“ Oh, she is far nicer than I am,” cried 
Adele. “ She wouldn’t trifle with the feelings 
of the man she loved, or play tricks with him 
just for the sake of fun. In fact, I almost 
blame her for taking such things too seriously. 
She hasn’t had too easy a time of it, poor girl, 
and it has made her, I think, altogether too 
humble. She met a young man in the midst 
of her troubles who, it seems, was civil to her, 
and even kind as men go, and what does she 
do but just sit down and worship the very 
memory of him, and cry out her pretty blue 
eyes over it—and he—he walks off and never 
gives her another thought. That’s the man 
of it!” 


18 



268 


March Hares, 


A gleam of indignation flashed through the 
moisture in her own eyes as she bent them 
upon her companion. Her bosom heaved the 
more as she discerned a broad smile extending 
itself upon his face. 

“ Although I might demur to details,” he 
said, restraining the gaiety which struggled 
for expression in his voice, “ I must not pre¬ 
tend to fail to recognise the portrait you have 
drawn. I am the guilty man ! ” 

“ You laugh at it I ” she exclaimed. “ To 
you it seems a joke! ” 

“ Are you so certain that there isn’t a joke 
concealed somewhere about it ? ” he suggested, 
calmly. 

“ I lose patience with you ! You make a 
jest of everything. Tell me this much: Do 
you or do you not know her present address ? ” 
“ I know precisely where she is to be found 
at the present moment,” said David, speaking 
now with gravity. 

“ Well, and have you been there to see her? 
Have you written to her there? Have you 
given her the slightest sign since she has been 



Ma/rcli Hares, 


269 


there of any desire on your part to ever see 
her again?” 

“ I must answer ‘ No ’ to each question, I 
am afraid,” he responded, and had the grace 
to hang his head. 

His evident humility only momentarily im¬ 
pressed her. “ I am disappointed in you,” she 
said. “Where will you find a sweeter or 
truer woman ? Don’t think I am throwing 
her at your head! Quite the contrary. If 
you were to ask for her now, I should advise 
with all my might against you. But you have 
behaved like a simpleton. I am going to 
have her always live with me, or near me. 
She is my own fiesh and blood, and I love her 
as if she were my sister. She doesn’t know, 
as yet, that I am aware of the relationship; 
but I have written to her this very morning, 
telling her to come and see me to-night, when 
I get back. I am going to spend some money 
in Scotland.” 

“ It will be profoundly appreciated, believe 
me.” 

She sniffed at his interjection. “ I intend 




270 


Ma/rch Hares, 


to buy land right and left in Elgin, and if 
Skirl Castle isn’t good enough—I don’t think 
much of it from the photographs—we’ll build 
a bigger one, and we’ll make that whole sec¬ 
tion hum; and Vestalia shall be as big an heir¬ 
ess as it contains, and the lucky man who mar¬ 
ries her shall be treated like a brother of mine 
and Archie’s. And that is what you have 
thrown away. I say it to you frankly, because 
it is all over so far as you are concerned. She 
will listen to me, and my mind is quite made 
up—and papa can tell you what that means! ” 

“ Even if your decision were not irrevoca¬ 
ble,” said David, solemnly, “ my answer would 
of necessity be the same. I would do much to 
please you, but I do not see my way to marry¬ 
ing your cousin.” 

They had paused to exchange these last 
sentences, and now upon the instant the Earl 
and his elderly companion came up. David 
essayed a revelatory wink to the nobleman, but 
it fell upon the stony places in Lord Drum- 
pipes wondering stare. 

Mr. Skinner wiped his brow decorously, 



March Hares, 


271 


and breathed appreciation of the halt. “ Sir,” 
he began, addressing David, “ I must assume 
that I am enjoying the opportunity of study¬ 
ing a district of England peculiarly favoured 
by Nature, and exceptionally embellished as 
well by the hand of man ; but I wish to give 
expression to emotions of unmixed delight at 
all that I observe about me. We have in¬ 
spected the internal appointments of the an¬ 
cient hostelry, and have revelled, sir, in the 
luxurious yet studiously regulated beauties of 
this garden, and I confess that the novelty of 
the one and the charm of the other far surpass 
anything-” 

“ Papa,” interposed his daughter, with cold 
severity, “ we will leave these gentlemen to en¬ 
joy the novelties and charms by themselves for 
a few minutes, if you please. I have an ex¬ 
planation to make to you, since no one else 
offers it, and I think it should be no longer 
deferred.” 

She took her father’s arm as she spoke, 
and led him in a direct line across the sward 
toward the broad, low-lying, ivy-clad rear of 



272 


March Hares, 


the hotel. “ Oh, it’s all right; they don’t 
mind your walking on the grass in England,” 
the two young men heard her say as she de¬ 
parted. 

These partners in deception gazed after 
her for a space. Then they looked at each 
other. 

“ Davie, I don’t like it,” said the Earl. 

“ Don’t like what?” 

“ I’m afraid she’s got some kind of an ink¬ 
ling. It looks as if a suspicion were dawning 
in her mind. I warned you she was keen of 
scent.” 

Mosscrop hurst forth with a peremptory 
guffaw of laughter. “ You duffer of the 
earth,” he cried, “ she knew all about you be¬ 
fore ever she laid eyes on you! ” He unfold¬ 
ed the chuckling narrative forthwith, to the 
Earl’s profound astonishment and concern. 

“ Why then, man,” Drumpipes ejaculated 
at last, staring hard at the close-cropped lawn, 
“ I can’t tell in the least if she loves me for 
myself alone.” 

“ Oh, you read that in some novel,” oh- 



Ma/rch Ha/res, 


273 


jected David. “It’s a mere phrase; it has no 
significance in real life.” 

“ Yes ; hut,” the other pursued, dejectedly, 
“ I don’t see how I can make sure that she 
loves me in any kind of way.” 

“ At all events, she’s going to marry you,” 
David re-assured him. “She mentioned the 
fact to me, casually. And she’s going to buy 
up Elgin right and left, and build a new Skirl 
Castle as big as Olympia, and generally make 
everything else north of the Grampians ‘ sing 
small ’—I believe that’s the phrase.” 

The Earl assimilated this intelligence with 
a kindling eye. “Man, it’s fine!” he cried, 
as the prospect spread itself out before his 
mental vision. “ Ah, poor Davie, you dinna 
ken what it is to be in love! ” 

Mosscrop sighed. “ When you talk Scots, 
Archie,” he said, “ I know it’s going to cost me 
money. I foresee that you’ll kick about the 
bill. But, hurry, man, and catch up with 
them. She’s quite capable of flouncing out of 
the house, and dragging her father along, too, 
while the fit is on her; and that would only 



274 


March Ha/res. 


mean more bother to coax them back. Come 
on!” 

He started at a brisk pace in pursuit, and 
Drumpipes strode eagerly beside him. They 
overtook their guests on the very threshold of 
the door, and the Earl called out a breathless, 
entreating “Adele!” The girl, upon reflec¬ 
tion, turned, and surveyed the pair with an 
austere eye. 

“ Wait a moment, papa,” she said in her 
coldest tone; “ one of these two gentlemen 
seems to feel authorised to address me by my 
Christian name, and apparently has also some 
communication to make to us.” 

“Well,” stammered Drumpipes, hesitat¬ 
ingly, “ there’s an awfully good luncheon been 
ordered, you know.” 

Mosscrop emitted an abrupt, resonant note 
of laughter, and in the silence which ensued 
displayed violent muscular efforts to keep a 
grin from convulsing his face. 

Adele preserved the severity of her aspect 
for a little. “ I think it might occur to yow. 
Lord Drumpipes,” she began, markedly ad- 



March Hares, 


275 


dressing her remarks to the rightful bearer of 
the title, “ that after what has happened—and 
on this point, I can assure you my father feels 
exactly as I do-” 

She stopped here, with the effect of appeal¬ 
ing to her father for immediate confirmation 
of their infiexible joint attitude. 

“ I need scarcely observe,” began Mr. Skin¬ 
ner, putting up his pince-nez and looking 
down upon the two young men with sternness 
from the vantage of the door-step, “ that what¬ 
ever course my daughter deems it consistent 
with her dignity to pursue, in the face of the 
extraordinary, and, I may confidently add, un¬ 
precedented circumstances which we are called 
upon to—to confront, has my most unswerv¬ 
ing adhesion.” 

A waiter opened the door inward at this 
instant, and overlaid Mr. Skinner’s peroration 
with a clear-cut message, Germanic in its non- 
essentials, but broadly human in import. 

The old gentleman gasped, twiddled the 
string of his glasses in his fingers, and leant 
his head sidewise toward his daughter. “ Yes, 



276 


March Ha/res. 


but what is it we’re going to do ? ” he inquired 
in a nervous whisper. 

“Do?” cried Mosscrop, who had caught 
her glance in his own, and convicted it of 
latent merriment, “ Do ? Why we’re going to 
laugh at a harmless pleasantry happily ended, 
and pass in to luncheon.” 

“ Yes, papa,” said Adele, upon considera¬ 
tion, and with a dawning smile upon her lips, 
“ I think that is what we’re going to do.” 

When they found themselves standing 
about the table in the private room, overlook¬ 
ing through open French windows the de¬ 
lightful sunlit garden from which they had 
come, Mosscrop seized the moment of hesi¬ 
tation about seats to hold up his hand. 
Though he had been bereft of his borrowed 
dignities, the air of natural command sat easi¬ 
ly upon him. 

“ I have to ask you for a minute or two of 
delay,” he said. “ It will explain itself.” 

He wrote something on a card as he spoke, 
and gave it to the waiter with a closely-guarded 
whisper of injunction. As the servant left the 



March Hares. 


277 


room, David turned to the others with a radi¬ 
ant face. 

“ Mr. Skinner,” he began, “ and my younger 
friends, there is a toast which in England is 
always drunk standing. It occurs to me to 
propose it to you, on this single occasion, be¬ 
fore we have taken our seats at all. As has 
been remarked with characteristic perspicaci¬ 
ty, the circumstances which we find ourselves 
called upon to confront are extraordinary 
in character, and altogether unprecedented. 
Through the courtesy of my friends, I have 
for a brief period had devolved upon me the 
responsibility of behaving, at stated intervals, 
as a member of the Scotch peerage should be¬ 
have. I view my deportment throughout this 
ordeal, in retrospect, with a considerable de¬ 
gree of satisfaction. I have spared no pains 
to realise my conception of the part. The es¬ 
sential thing about a successful peerage, I 
take it, is that it should be invested, for ordi¬ 
nary eyes, with a glamour of unreality. A 
Baron should be perceptibly romantic. A 
Viscount, if he respects his station should 



278 


March Hares, 


quite envelope himself in the mists of the 
improbable. As for an Earl, he should live 
frankly in fairyland. My imagination does 
not run to Marquises and Dukes, but I think I 
may say I have grasped the ideal of an Earl.” 

“ The true ideal of an Earl,” interposed 
Drumpipes, with inspiration, “ is never to let 
victuals get cold.” 

Mosscrop smiled and nodded. “Only a 
minute more,” he said. “ I spoke about fairy¬ 
land. I have been under its spell all this 
week. I have committed myself to its charm 
for the rest of my days. When you return to 
London this evening, northward, it is Archie 
who will drive you. I go southward to the 
Loire country instead, under the magic of the 
enchantment which beckons and guides and 
propels me, all in one. To quit riddles, good 
people, you will notice that there is a fifth 
place laid here before us. To connect this 
fact with the toast, the seat is waiting for my 
Queen. This is Sherry, decanted from the 
‘ Anchor’s ’ oldest bin. I suggest to you the 
filling of your glasses.” 



March Ha/res, 


279 


He moved toward the door as he spoke, 
opened it, and turned to the others, with Ves- 
talia on his arm. 

“ Mr. Skinner,” he said gently. “We crave 
your approbation for what we have done. We 
were married by the registrar of St. Dunstan’s 
at ten o’clock this morning, and your niece 
came on here direct by train, bringing her 
li^ggage and my own, which I thank God de¬ 
voutly will always travel together in future. 
We love each other very, very much.” 

There fell here upon the masculine vision 
the spectacle of two women entwined in each 
other’s arms, and of two beautiful heads, one 
raven-black, one glowing like light through 
clouded amber, bent tenderly together. The 
sound of little moans proceeded from thh 
swaying, interlocked group, and then of kisses 
and of subdued ecstatic sobbing laughter. 

Lord Drumpipes, staring vacantly from 
these women to his boyhood friend, gulped his 
sherry in an absent-minded way. David, in 
rapid whispers, outlined meanwhile the situa¬ 
tion to his bewildered ear. 



280 


Ma/rch Hares, 


“ Eh ! ” he called out at last. “ It is the 
same lassie? The yellow-haired one? The 
one who smashed my moosie ? ” 

“ Shut up, you loon! ” growled David 
fiercely, under his breath. “ Is this the time 
to blab about such things ? I kicked your 
your old cow into splinters, and I’ll serve the 
rest of the idiotic show the same way if you 
mention the word ‘ moose.’ Chuck it, man! 
That’s a thing for the girls to tell each other 
a year hence, perhaps. Have some delicacy 
about you ! ” He turned to Mr. Skinner, who 
stood as one petrified, his gaze riveted upon 
the young women. 

“ I’ve been explaining to my friend. Lord 
I)rumpipes,” David said, lifting his voice, “ the 
romantic nature of my acquaintance with your 
niece, my wife. I think you have been told 
about it.” 

Mr. Skinner shifted his glance to the 
speaker. “ To some extent—to some extent,” 
he murmured weakly. “ It has taken me 

greatly by surprise. I scarcely know-” 

David had advanced, and was holding out 



March Hailes. 


281 


his hand, with a confident, masterful sort of 
smile. 

“ I suppose it’s all right,” the old gentle¬ 
man said, sending confused, appealing glances 
toward his inattentive daughter. “ Adele 
seems not to object—I take it for granted 
that-” 

Adele lifted her head, and drew a protect¬ 
ing arm round Vestalia. “Hold up your 
chin,” she whispered, audibly. “ They’re 
nothing to be frightened of. You know 
everybody except your cousin Archie, and he’s 
only to be feared by creatures who can’t shoot 
back.” 

The bride, nestling against the other’s 
shoulder, raised a luminous face, and looked 
about her with a smile of frank happiness. 
“ Frightened ?” she queried, and'then shook 
her fair head joyously in answer. 

The waiter came in with the tureen. 


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